Lost: Season 5 - Page 7

Re: Lost: Season 5

Wow! This episode was fantastic. I can't believe how much this show continues to shock me with the new revelations even after all we know.

So Widmore was an other. I'm guessing once Richard started recruiting Ben as a young boy this caused a major rift/power struggle between the two of them which lead to Widmore being banished from the island or something like that. Also due to Faraday's rules about time travel, he got away from Locke/Sawyer/Juliet because killing him then would alter the time line. Hence Locke couldn't shoot him when given the chance.

Desmond named his son after Charlie!

Creepy old lady is Faraday's mother.

Locke set in motion the events that explain why Richard visits him as a child and an infant.

Finally, and this is just a guess on my part, but something interesting about what Faraday said about burying the bomb. He asked if they had access to a large amount of concrete. Now remember the swan station, had that weird wall that was magnetized which was described as being solid concrete, and it was buried underground. Could the bomb be related to the 'incident' at the swan, and be why they had to push the button every 108 minutes?

Re: Lost: Season 5

I suspect you're right about the bomb, Jeff. It also occurs to me that the "white flash" of the time shift is awfully reminiscent of an atomic blast. Maybe the time shifts and the bomb's (eventual?) explosion are linked? The island obviously has special time properties, but I would suspect such properties interacting with an atomic bomb would be catastrophic. This still doesn't explain a lot, of course...

Re: Lost: Season 5

OK, so we don't know for a fact that the island itself is hopping around - but we DO know that the remaining survivors are: first from 2005 to some time between 2001 and 2004, when Locke saw the drug plane crash on the island and was subsequently shot by Ethan; then to post-2005 when Richard Alpert patched Locke's leg up and gave him the compass; then back again to some time between 2001 and 2004, when Faraday spoke to Desmond and told him to find his mother in the future; then to 1954 when Locke met Richard and Faraday found the hydrogen bomb; then finally to some unspecified time.

In other words the time-hopping survivors are arriving at seemingly random points in time. This we know. But there is no evidence to suggest that, when the island vanished in 2005, it was actually moving through time in a similar way. In other words it might have just moved in space, changing location. It is reasonable to assume, however, that whatever is happening to the people on the island is connected to what is happening to the island itself. That's all we can really say at this point.

As for the possibility of Locke bumping into a younger version of himself off the island, we know this is not possible. Faraday has made it very clear that you cannot change what has already happened. Locke never met himself, so he never will.

Oddly enough I feel the exact opposite! I thought episode two was a little bit weak, but Jughead was one of the best episodes of the entire series.

I came so close with my prediction a few days ago! I said that I thought the people with the flaming arrows were originally from the US Army, hence Goodwin's knife in The Other 48 Days.

I quite agree. Richard seemed pretty clueless about the whole time-hopping thing. He had absolutely no reason to believe what Locke told him regarding becoming their leader. Locke being born on the exact date he was expecting must have filled Richard with hope that Locke had been telling the truth, but he would then spend years trying and failing to recruit him. Poor Richard - I bet he was super-pleased when Locke finally crash-landed on the island.

Did Richard tell Ben about Locke? As I already suggested, this might explain why Ben felt so threatened by Locke's arrival. In fact I'll go one step further: Ben's spinal tumour appeared around the time of the crash, so I'm guessing it was the universe's way of course-correcting. Locke was destined to arrive on that date, so Ben had to go. What I find particularly interesting about my theory is that, had Jack not been on the plane, Ben would have died. So if it was destiny for Ben to die of a spinal tumour, what was Jack doing on flight 815? Hmmm...

That's genius! I hadn't made the connection... but it fits perfectly. I love the fact that, when you look more closely at the young actors cast as Eloise and Widmore, you can actually see a resemblance to their future counterparts.

Quite. Which leads me back to my theory that Locke ain't the right guy, that destiny has been screwed up somehow. How could a guy who fails Richard's test... who ignores good advice to join Mittelos Bioscience... who spends the majority of his later years in a wheelchair feeling bitter about life... become the leader of the Others? Nobody ever said he should be, except for Richard. And Richard only said that because Locke told him he would say it. Abaddon, the character who encouraged Locke to take the 'walkabout' (which resulted in Locke coming to the island) might well be conspiring to screw up destiny. If he is working with Widmore, then maybe this was part of Widmore's plan. Who knows?

You beat me to it! When Faraday mentioned burying the bomb in concrete, I instantly thought of the massive concrete wall in the Swan station, and what Sayid said about it reminding him of Chernobyl. If this is true then we might finally get some definitive answers about the 'incident' soon.

Fantastic episode.

Re: Lost: Season 5

This is one of the best season and also it's my favorite. I re - watch all the episodes on tv show online.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Maybe the reason the Black Rock is in the middle of the island is because the island appeared beneath it in one of the moves?

Regarding the Swan, the Lost: Via Domus video game did allow us to see what was behind that wall, and it wasn't the bomb. The script for the game was written by Lindelof and Cuse.

Re: Lost: Season 5

I might be naive. But, I really think that Widmore was being honest when he told Desmond to take his daughter away and hide her. Which would make sense since Ben told Widmore that he was going to kill Penny.

Hawking was the old woman that spoke to Desmond in London and then was the woman who Ben saw trying to locate the island??

Re: Lost: Season 5

Indeed, that sounds like a winner to me. Damn it, why do these things always go right over my head. Sometimes I feel so dumb when I come on this forum the next day.


This might also explain why Ben was so urgently interesed in possible Oceanic survivors as soon as he saw the plane going down. Also why he insisted to Ethan and co. to "not get involved". As in, if Locke was one of the survivors who was destined to be the leader and the others sent to them did "get involved" Locke might be destined to gain influence over them which would threaten Ben's position.


That's what I am not fully understanding. I don't see any reason why Locke at that age, where as far as he was concerned as a kid noting about the island ever happened to him yet, would have any pre-recognition of the compass. The only way I would see that working if if someone other than Richard went back in time to Locke as a child and told him to "choose the compass" prior to Richard coming to visit.


How long before the BD sets of Seasons one and two come out? I really need to go back and start from the beginning.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Correct.

One other thing that just occurred to me: When we were introduced to Faraday back in Ep 2. of Season 4, he was watching the news coverage of the wreckage of Flight 185 being found on the bottom of the ocean, and having a severe emotional response to it. Someone comes up behind him and asks why he is so emotional, and he reply's "I don't know". That all makes sense now, if he has been time traveling, then he would have already have a close personal connection to the survivors of 815, he just doesn't know it yet. Just like Desmond's memory of talking to Faraday outside the hatch suddenly appeared.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Regarding the Lost:Via Dominus game showing what's in the swan station, I was vaguely aware of that which is why I prefaced my bomb-in-the-swan theory with "Just a guess". However, even though the game was written by Lindeloff and Cruise, I still am not sure how cannon it is considered. Sort of like the on-line game a few years ago where the reward video attempted to explain the 'numbers'.

Anyway I'm probably wrong, but I was taking this theory further, and thinking that maybe the bomb is what Desmond detonated at the end of Season 2 when he turned the fail safe key in the swan.

Re: Lost: Season 5

This falls into the same kind of problem for me as the "why would Locke recognize the compass as a boy" If Faraday doesn't know why he's emotional that means he is not yet the Faraday that time travels and meets survivors of Oceanic 815. So why would he have any extraordinary emotional reaction to that event at that point in time. Unless in "Lost" time is circular as in Locke, Faraday, Desmond etc. Live their lives, die and some point and a circular space time continum has them born again back in the past, but this time with subconcious knowledge of thier future life. That would explain why Locke as a child might have known about the compass, why Desmond has a vague recognition on Faraday even though they had never seen each other before. Thinking about that, that would certainly explain the phenomenon of Deja Vu or why some people are very perceptive. Has this theory been stated by anyone before in real life, maybe I'm on to something here.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Updated redshirt dead, with a rewatch of last week's episode and yesterday's:

48 original fuselage survivors - I don't think they counted the guy who got sucked into the engine, but did count Ethan. I'll count the engine guy but not Ethan for my 48.

The dead - guy sucked into the engine, girl who drowned early on, the marshall, Steve(or was it Scott?) who Ethan killed, Arzt, Boone, Shannon, Paulo and Nikki, Charlie, three killed at the huts by the mercenaries, Michael, Jin and three sent to the ship when Daniel ferried them across (not the ones with Daniel on the second ferry trip), at least 5 shot by arrows (Frogurt, one with head on fire, one lying still on ground with arrow in back, one upright shot in the back, one shot in the chest, might be others), two blown up by mines. I make that out at least as 25 killed.

Walt is off the island, as are five of the Oceanic 6 (Aaron doesn't count). Claire is in the hut. Sawyer, Locke and Rose are with the beach crew. So I come up with 13 fuselage red shirts left at most.

That doesn't add up to the 20 mentioned by the 1954 Others though. Sawyer, Rose, Bernard, Miles, Juliet, Faraday, and Charlotte plus 13 redshirts. With at least 7 redshirts dead (5 arrows, 2 mines), that would leave only 6 fuselage red shirts left.

Also someone mentioned Richard being the leader of the Others in 1954. He wasn't; remember when he said they had to kill the US soldiers when they wouldn't leave, as per the chain of command and they were following orders.

Re: Lost: Season 5

It was my impression that that was referring to Jacob, but I could be wrong.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Forgive me but I get to give it up to myself so infrequently with this show.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Ellie's maiden name is probably Hawking. Simple as that.

Re: Lost: Season 5

In 1954 Richard Alpert seems to be the Head Other, guy who takes orders from Jacob. When 815 crashes on the island he is no longer in charge but Ben is, and presumably Charles Widmore had this role before him.

What I'm wondering is, why did Richard move down a step in the chain of command. This may not be the right way to describe it since he isn't 2nd in command now but more of an adviser to the leader.

Re: Lost: Season 5

I think Richard is always the number two man for The Others. If the leader dies or leaves or is 'un-chosen' (like Ben), he doesn't officially take over or move up to the number one spot, he just looks for a new leader while filling in until he finds a new boss.

Re: Lost: Season 5

So Widmore and Ellie are a couple of gun totin' military hard-asses on the island together. Hmmmmmm ... Did they get together? Oh the possibilities .....

Re: Lost: Season 5

I felt a glimpse of past frustrations with this show when Juliette said in her usual matter-of-fact way "Richard has always been here" and no one pressed her to elaborate. That's actually OK at this point, as enough weird shit has happened to the survivors that they can take stuff like that in stride now and just worry about finding solutions, rather than marveling at the latest anomaly in a setting that is obviously anything but normal at this point.

But back in S1 or S2, someone like Rousseau, or Ben would utter a line like that, and everyone would have been like "OK" and moved on.

I've catching episodes of the 1st season on syndication. LOST is a great show, but much of the earlier seasons required absurd levels of non-communication and pointless secrecy among the survivors to string viewers along.

It's not so much that answers were slow to come across, as the fact that characters didn't seem terribly interested in pursuing them. That was the frustrating part.

Just reminiscing....

--
H

Re: Lost: Season 5

Actually, that was the impression that I got from the episode. That the gun totin' young Other may in fact be Widmore's wife, aka Penny's mother. There is more of a resemblance between her and Penny than her and Faraday, if you ask me. That could be another possiblity as to why Faraday recognized her. Maybe it will end up that Faraday and Penny are siblings, possibly.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Holadem, I agree with the early communication. I am sure if you go back to my posts from the first season or two. You would read me complaining about when they meet someone. They never ask any questions about anything important. You to frustrate the crap out of me.

Re: Lost: Season 5

totally agree; i think there's just as much non-communication now, and we're just used to it. remember when Sun approached Widmore in London and he asked 'why would you want to help me?'; she just did a soap opera turn-around and walked away. riiiiight....

Re: Lost: Season 5

The best thing about this week's show was the revelation about
the compass.

I hate to give so much credit to the structure of this show (as
I always thought they made up shit as they went along), but the
entire scene with Richard visiting the young Locke and putting the
compass on the table now makes complete sense.

If this show continues to work on the same kind of structure that
was not only put into place seasons ago, but refers to episodes seasons
ago, this is going to be a fun revelation process.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Ron, the compass was only introduced about 5 episodes ago so it's not exactly proof of a grand design! I think the writers were "making up shit as they went along" right up to season 3 and the infamous Jack tattoo flashback, which was responsible for convincing the studio to grant the writers an end date. Up until that point, the show was treading water. Cuse and Lindelof may well have had ideas up their sleeve (such as Richard visiting Locke as a boy) for a while, but until they could see the finish line, they were clearly struggling to map out the story as they would have liked. Ironically due to the Writers Strike they ended up with less episodes than they were promised for season 4, which meant that certain plots were cut. Talk about going from one extreme to the other!

Anyway, I'm just glad they're finally able to lay some cards out on the table. If it hadn't been for Stranger in a Strange Land... we'd probably never have got Jughead.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Not only that, but in the same episode (Cabin Fever) there is a shot of Richard standing by a hospital window looking in at baby Locke, so he was there for Locke's birth.

Re: Lost: Season 5

I think the fans actually write the show.

Re: Lost: Season 5

another thing, the bomb now shows that maybe there really was a
quarantine issue.
the hatch had the "quarantined" stamp on it.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Locke did ask how old is he and this was before they actually went down there and saw that he looked like he was still the same age.
He could have been very young, a child the same as Widmore.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Simon's right; in some cases, Cuse and Lindelof (and the writers) didn't have many of the plot machinations mapped out until several episodes before they occurred. Many of the characters were introduced for one purpose and then stayed on (/went away) for another (Michael, Ben, Eko, Ana Lucia). This is not true across the board of course, and it's my understanding that the larger plot structure, and certainly the thematic arc of the entire series, was constructed fairly early. But that they've managed to make (semi)-coherent sense of their early mysteries, which were created more to mystify than to be solved, is pretty astonishing.

Good improvisation, creative retcon, call it what you will...

The end-date has apparently galvanized the writing staff (like when a marathon runner sees the finish line)... which explains the breakneck plotting of last season, and certainly the start of the fifth.

It's fun watching the first two seasons again, knowing everything we know now. I always thought the show worked well as a slow-burning character study (loved Seasons 2 and 3), and never felt bored, but for many viewers the glacial revelations (and lack of character inquisitiveness) was just too maddening and distracting.

Re: Lost: Season 5

Totally agree.


Totally disagree.

I've noticed a lot more direct questioning, beginning toward the end of last season. Remember Locke, Ben and Hurley looking for Jacob's cabin, then later marching toward the Orchid? Locke was peppering Ben with questions and Ben was, more or less, answering them.

This was so distinct, it appeared intentional on the writers' part, likely due to past criticisms.

And it made/makes a great show even greater.

Jon

Re: Lost: Season 5

I really like your precog angle Will.

I DO think that Locke may have had some inkling about the compass as a child. IIRC when he was to choose which item already belonged to him, didn't he pull aside the compass and vial of sand(?) first? Not only that but Richard did see the "Smokey" drawing so I would think it's fairly obvious that Locke is who he said he is. However when he did ultimately choose the knife and Richard is visibly upset I interpreted it as Richard is disappointed in his choice because of what the knife represents: Another leader who follows the "way of the sword" as opposed to peace.