Emmy Noms

EW's got the list of the big ones.

The good: Lost for Best Drama, Michael Emerson for Best Supporting Actor.

The bad: Nothing else (non script-wise, haven't checked the writing noms).

The ugly: Elizabeth Mitchell gets snubbed again.

I swear, what the heck does she have to do to get an Emmy Nomination, blow up a hydrogen bomb on screen? ;)

Hope your summer's going well. I'm currently buried in grant hell. Hope to escape soon. :)

One More Hour

No, not for me. I'm so buried with work I haven't had time to post anything lately.

However, it does seem that we're getting an extra hour of LOST next season! Think of it as a little, happy tidbit to brighten your summer. Hope everyone has a good 4th! :)

Blargh

Kitchen remodeling and work has kept me from getting the new poll up, but I'll have it up by Monday. :)

Have a good weekend everyone!

Best Scene Of Season 5

Results from the last poll. Quite the variety, eh? This season really had some terrific moments all throughout.

Sayid "kills" young Ben Linus (He's Our You) - 6 votes

Zombie Locke tells Ben he's going to kill Jacob (Follow The Leader) - 5 votes

Juliet detonates the bomb (The Incident) - 4 votes

"Hello, Ben. Welcome back to the land of the living." (Whatever Happened, Happened) - 4 votes

"Hello, Jin. I'm Danielle. Danielle Rousseau." (The Little Prince) - 3 votes

Zombie Locke comes across an unconscious Ben (The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham) - 2 votes

Next week's poll is going to be something somewhat similar in that we're going to pick the best scene of Season 5, but I'm going to need some help choosing the selections. There's certainly a lot to choose from and I really want to pick the best of the best. Also, the above scenes are all open for inclusion. My short list:

Locke meets Richard and Charles Widmore in 1954 (Jughead)

Danielle finds Jin (The Little Prince)

Danielle kills Montand (This Place Is Death)

Locke (with a broken leg) turns the wheel in front of "Christian" (This Place Is Death)

Jack and company realize Lapidus if flying their plane (316)

Ben kills Locke (The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham)

Introducing Jim LaFleur (the opening scene of that episode)

Sawyer confronts Richard in 1974 (LaFleur)

Sayid "kills" Ben Linus (He's Our You)

Miles argues with Hurley about time travel (Whatever Happened, Happened)

Smokey Alex gives Ben an order (Dead is Dead)

Miles and Hurley go for a ride with Dr. Chang (Some Like It Hoth)

Kate crashes Sawyer and Juliet's party on the sub (Follow The Leader)

Locke gets Richard to close his time loop (Follow The Leader)

Jacob converses with his Nemesis (The Incident)

Zombie Locke tells Ben that he's the one who's going to kill Jacob (The Incident)

Sawyer and Company finally run into Bernard, Rose and Vincent (The Incident)

Ben kills Jacob, Zombie Locke pushes his body into the fire (The Incident)

Juliet detonates the bomb (The Incident)

I tried to pick scenes that affected me emotionally and ones that ran the gamut from seriousness to wonder, humor to revulsion. I hated the multiple love triangles this season, but the scene with Sawyer, Juliet and Kate in the sub was (IMHO) one of the season's best simply because it made me feel so awful for Juliet afterwards. In contrast, Kate's tearful goodbye with Aaron (that perhaps some of you liked better) really had no effect on me.

So anything I missed? Any favorite scene I should include? I'll keep this bumped for a couple days then post the poll. :)

New Poll

Not surprisingly, "The Incident" ran away with the best episode poll, though quite a few other episodes got at least one vote - certainly more than I thought would. The new poll is for the best LOST ending of Season 5, i.e. a shock trombone ending that has to be the last moment or two of the episode.

I picked the ones I thought were best overall rather than listing every single one (like Desmond telling Penny he has to go to Oxford in "Because You Left"). This poll, I think, will be a bit more divided between a couple choices. See what you think.

I'll be away until next Tuesday, but should have a new poll for next week and maybe a posting or two upon my return. Have a nice weekend everyone! :)

Lost In Three Sentences...

Bigmouth has offered up the Three-Sentence Theory Challenge, that he snagged from someone on The Fuselage. The idea?

Can you express your theory of what's happening on Lost in three sentences or less? Aphorisms, metaphors, and analogies are welcome, run-on sentences are not.

Been thinking about this for a couple days. My answer:

1. Two gods play a game to decide the fate of all humans, using the passengers of Flight 815 (and the Others) as the pieces and the Island as the board.

2. Despite being manipulated by cosmic forces, everyone ultimately has the free will to change his or her own fate.

3. However, not only are there consequences for what one chooses to do, their heart (the culmination of everything they've done in life) will be weighed and judged in the end by the Smoke Monster.

It's a bit more vague than I usually like, but it's the best I can do. Any other takers? :)

New Poll

I was surprised "Jacob's Nemesis" won my previous poll on what to call him. I'll be using that whenever I refer to him over the summer. My schedule the next couple weeks is going to be busy as I'm traveling to both Boston and New Orleans, so my blogging time is going to be rather sparse.

My new poll is up, although I expect it's going to be heavily skewed towards "The Incident," but you never know. "LaFleur" and "Dead is Dead" were both terrific episodes (especially the latter, given we now about Jacob's Nemesis) and the ending of "Jeremy Bentham" certainly becomes much sadder in retrospect.

I'm revising my Top 10 episode list as well, but I have to back and rewatch a few before I start posting those. Everyone have a nice Memorial Day? :)

Couple Theories...

Doc Jensen and Bigmouth have some interesting and very different takes on the finale. Here's a point from each that struck me, first up is Doc:

Last week, I speculated that in the new Lost timeline that will flow out of Juliet's detonation of Jughead, the characters that angelic Jacob visited and conspicuously touched during the flashbacks — definitely Sawyer, Kate, Sun, Jin, Jack, Locke, and Hurley — will retain their memories of the previous, now-deleted timeline. (Similar yet slightly different to what happened to Desmond after he was physically obliterated by the Swan's implosion — his consciousness migrated to the fateful week in which he broke up with Penny.)

I speculated on something like this after "The Variable" aired, only guessing that it was going to be Desmond alone that retained his memories rather than the whole group. I kinda like that idea better because it's less messy - if the entire time line changes, then when will all of Jacob's touchy-feely guys get their memories back? Will they have them from birth? Will they just suddenly remember (like Desmond did of Faraday's message)? Or will their minds be transported to their alternate time line's bodies ala Desmond in "Flashes Before Your Eyes?" If they do end up retaining memories, I think the latter is the most plausible way. Of course, when in the time line they end up is solely at the discretion of the writers.

But the big problem with changing the future in general is that it would also likely negate Jacob's death. If Flight 815 never crashes, there's no loophole for Jacob's Nemesis either (unless the Island is somehow immune to the time change). Why the heck would they even want to go back if they know Jacob is still alive and Jacob's Nemesis' motivation is thwarted? This fact alone makes me think Jack and crew caused the Incident rather than negated it. Plus, if "they're coming" means Jack and company are being transported back to 2007, then it seems likely time didn't change.

Bigmouth has the same sort of problem with this:

Nothing we've already seen on the show has changed as a result of detonation of the Jughead's fission trigger. Flight 815 crashed on the Island just as it always did -- there is no reboot yielding a grandfather paradox. If that's where the show were going, I believe we would have received some small but clear indication of its direction. Something like Cort's horn -- those of you familiar with the Stephen King's Dark Tower series will know what I mean. Instead, we got just the opposite in Miles's sardonic comment that Jack and Co. might be causing the Incident by trying to prevent it.

By that same token, it's equally wrong to say this was all simply a case of whatever happened, happened. I maintain that our Losties, like Desmond, changed what was supposed to happen. It is this altered timeline, in which they save the world, that we've witnessed thus far. Because neither the Incident nor activation of the Fail-Safe was supposed to happen, the general rule of course correction doesn't apply. Both events must thus be actively preserved. If anything changes, as Ms. Hawking said, every single one of us is dead.

In other words, the reason all this happened is because now they're supposed to be transported back to 2007 and save the world from Jacob's Nemesis. Yes, they caused the whole situation in the first place (likely because of Jacob's Nemesis' machinations behind the scenes), but because Jacob visited them all in the past, he set up a loophole of his own so they can make everything right again (and possibly get himself resurrected in Frank's body). Erasing the fact that Jacob gets killed is the biggest problem I have with the changing the future scenario.

And one last point to chew on - we know Desmond still "has a role to play," according to Eloise, and we know he's going to end up back on the Island at some point (in order to tragically break his promise to Penny - you know the writers wouldn't have set that plot point up for nothing). So if all the Incident Losties do end up back in 2007, how does Desmond get back to the Island? What motivation is there for him to go and what will he have to do when he gets there? I'm guessing that Desmond is so important that Jacob's Nemesis tries to kill him and his family, so Desmond goes back in order to protect Penny and Charlie and plays an instrumental role in the Nemesis' defeat.

That's my theory for the moment anyway. I'm sure it will change 27,000 times between now and next year. :)

Another Reason The Rival May Not Be Smokey...

Looking back over my review of "Dead is Dead," I came across this screenshot I had totally forgotten about (via Dark UFO):



If the Rival is really the Anubis pictured here, then Smokey is definitely something different all together. To me, it looks like Anubis is summoning Smokey here, which gives some credence to the thought Smokey might be one of his minions or servants. One could certainly take it the other way around, I suppose, so that Anubis is genuflecting to Smokey instead, but my feeling is that Anubis is in command in this panel. Just something else to think about.

Also, what does everyone want to call Jacob's significant other? Rival? Nemesis? Enemy? The Man in Black? I've been going back and forth between Rival and Nemesis to see which sounds better, but I can't decide. I've added a poll on the sidebar with the question. Starting next week I'll also have a series of polls on Season 5, for best episode, best scene, best quote, best revelation, etc... :)

Incident Tidbits And Second Viewing Thoughts

(This is essentially Part III of my Incident review. Click here for Part I and Part II)

I was going to go over some scenes and happenings in light of The Incident, but my outline is kinda long, so maybe I'll make it an off season series of posts instead. Em and I just watched the finale a second time and, upon a second viewing, I think it actually might be the best finale of the show. I do need to go back and watch "Exodus" again, but I think this may have even topped that. A couple things that struck me:

1) All the acting in this episode was spectacular. I mentioned Michael Emerson and Elizabeth Mitchell before, but Terry O'Quinn also deserves a mention for actually playing someone other than the character he's played for five years. It was a masterful, subtle performance and I wonder if he's going to play the Rival for the entire next season? Will Terry O'Quinn now become the main villain of the show? That would be pretty cool.

Even Jack, Kate and Sawyer deserve some props. I still disliked the scene between Jack and Sawyer, but Matthew Fox and Josh Holloway did their very best with what they were given. Evangeline Lilly too (who looked better in this episode than she has in a long time, I think). And that last scene between Sawyer and Juliet was even more heart wrenching on a second watch. If Juliet is truly dead, she certainly gave it her all at the end.

2) This is something I totally missed the other night - must have be distracted for a second or two: Seeing what was on the parchment in Jacob's cabin (click for biggie version, thanks to Dark UFO):



Yeah, looks like the statue is definitely Taweret. This, I think, might give a bit more credence to the idea that Jacob and his Rival are really Ra and Apep. And if that's the case, perhaps Smokey is really Taweret herself, since she's supposed to be the consort of Apep. That could explain why Smokey seemed to be helping him, especially in the scene with Ben and Alex.

3) Ilana, after returning from Jacob's cabin, said "He's not there. Someone else has been using it." I'm curious as to why she used the word "using" - it certainly implies that the Rival was impersonating Jacob there, rather than having been imprisoned. And that further implies that perhaps the ring of ash was protective rather than used for containment - in other words, the whole reason the Rival was able to co-opt the cabin was because the ring of ash was broken.

4) Jacob and touching. Linda and others have pointed out how Jacob seems to touch everyone of the Losties he visited. It can be debated as to whether he actually touches Jack and Sawyer when he hands them the pen and candy bar respectively, but Em was convinced some sort of contact was there. But I have a slightly alternate theory: What if it wasn't the touch that was important, what if it was the gift? What did he give everyone?

1) Kate - The lunchbox
2) Sawyer - The pen
3) Sun and Jin - His blessing
4) Sayid - His life
5) Jack - The candy bar
6) Hurley - Charlie's guitar

And you can also argue, he gave Locke his forgiveness for being the ultimate pawn in his demise (or perhaps his life - maybe Locke wouldn't have survived the fall without Jacob being there). Just something else to think about.

5) The Rival and the statue. I was a bit surprised the Rival needed Richard to tell him where Jacob was living. He had no idea all this time? Kinda odd.

6) Pierre Chang's arm. On a second look, it seems Pierre only got his hand pinched, not his entire arm. I need to go back and watch the Swan Orientation film again.

7) Frank as a candidate. This was mentioned somewhere else - I forget where - but is it possible that Frank might be a candidate for Jacob's next body? Perhaps Jacob will be reborn, much like Ra is every day, but he needs a new vessel who has to be a "good person." Maybe the reason Jacob (assuming it was actually Jacob that was giving Richard the lists over the years) was collecting good people, is because he knew this would happen and would need a new, uncorrupted vessel for his body. Perhaps that was why he had Ben put Walt in Room 23.

The more I think about this, the more I like it. And I love the idea that Frank could be the next Jacob. ^_^

Tidbits

* I meant to mention this in Part I of my review but I forgot. I watched the clip show before the finale that had a good deal of Darlton musings and they mentioned that the reason Jack, Hurley, Sayid and Kate were sent back in time was because they failed to replicate the conditions of Flight 815 adequately. In other words, it was a bit of an accident that they were sent back in time.

This also brings in question Kate's decision to leave Aaron behind. What if she had brought him along, or if Locke had asked Walt to come? Would that have been sufficient to prevent them from time shifting? And how does this fit in with the Rival's plan? I might muse on this in more detail later on.

* Anyone else notice the sub guys had their own DHARMA symbol? Cool.

* The book Jacob was reading when Locke fell was Everything That Rises Must Converge by Flannery O'Connor. It has a white dove pierced by a black arrow on the cover. Nice.

* Sun and Jin had a very nice setting for their wedding.

* I just realized that the scene where we get to see Jack counting to five was the original scene he recounted to Kate in the Pilot. Seems he conveniently left out the fact his dad was the one who helped him hold it together, much the same way he did to Kate. Very cool.

* What the heck was Ilana doing in Russia?

* Ben lied to Locke when he said he was a Pieces - he's actually a Sagittarius.

* Quotes- lots of good stuff this episode. Could quote Ben's entire speech to Jacob.

"Do you know how much I want to kill you right now?"

"If Jack wants to blow up the Island... good for Jack."

"I'm this way because of Jacob."

"I don't know... but his Korean is excellent." - I can't tell you how much I loved this line.

"Let's get it started!" - When Radzinsky said this, I clapped my hands.

"I know John Locke. And if I were you, I wouldn't give up on him." - D'oh, Jack!

"I'm not going to kill Jacob, Ben. You are."

"Because we're retired."

We're together, that's all that matters in the end." - <3 Rose and Bernard

"So I lied. That's what I do."

"Someone else has been using it."

"I'm sorry this happened to you." - Notice Jacob didn't say to Locke "I'm sorry this had to happen to you" - seems to implicate his Rival.

"Looks like you found your loophoole."

Summary:

After a second viewing and musing on it for a few days, I think this may be the best season finale, simply because of how it changes the way we have to view both Locke and Ben (something I'll talk further about in future posts). The introduction of Jacob and his Rival is a game changer on par with anything we've seen on the show, and certainly presses if not exceeds Jack's initial flash forward for the top spot. I think when the show finally runs its course, if the show ends well, this episode may become as iconic as anything seen on the show. It's a 5.0, easily.

So what's up here for the hiatus. Certainly a revision of my Top Ten episodes list and some musing on how some of the central mysteries of the show have changed. Plus I'd like to create a checklist of all things we need answers to in the final season and see if the writers deliver. I'll try and make a substantial post at least once a week - hopefully I won't be quite as busy this year as I was the last. :)