Happy Baseball!

Baseball is back! Woo hoo! Anyone else a fan out there? Anyone looking forward to the return of the National Pastime?

I have to say, the promise of a new season is one of the only things that has gotten me through thus week and it will be a welcome distraction over the next month.

I'm really excited about the Mets this season too, especially after the end of last season left such a bad taste in my mouth.

Hope everyone has a great weekend and Happy Baseball! =)

Hiatus - *sigh* - Link Dump #1

Only four days into the hiatus. How you holding up? Any shakes, sweating? Find yourself compensating with the box of Ho-Hos you had hidden away for emergencies? My tonic is Super Smash Bros. Brawl, one of the most wonderfully addictive games ever made. I put approximately 300+ hours on the previous Super Smash Bros. game for the Gamecube and this one, packed with even more stuff than it's predecessor and given added online capability, promises to blow that mark out of the water.

But if you're looking for a specific Lost fix, I have a few links I meant to post last week that fell by the wayside. First off, if you hadn't noticed the Darlton interview over at UGO that Lostpedia recently linked to, it's pretty interesting. Not only to they talk about the strike, going back to work and the season so far, but they talk about time travel a bit, including this line confirming something we pretty much already knew:

"I will say, though, that the first significant event in the show where we were thinking in the back of our minds that this is going to require a story telling element that isn't traditional narrative, is the discovery of Adam and Eve in the caves."

Now I have my own ideas on this that I posted over at the Lost Elders a while back, but it's nice to see them address it. Read the whole interview though, it's pretty good.

Second, Alan Sepinwall has another Darlton tidbit regarding the mysterious four-toed statue:

"That's actually a great story," Damon responds. "We did the four-toed statue on the show and basically we got a note back from the network, which was, 'This is too weird.' We're like, 'Do you watch the show? This is too weird?' And essentially they said, 'Could it be a six-toed statue?' If someone could explain why a six-toed statue is less weird than a four-toed statue, that's exactly what we will do."

Now I thought I read somewhere (maybe a podcast) that the statue was supposed to be a remnant of the previous island civilization that pre-dated DHARMA's arrival, something I to which I thought The Temple also belonged. This is why I think, despite the DHARMA symbol on the map to the Temple from last episode, it's still an original island structure that DHARMA took over upon arrival. And, even if they think it's weird, I do hope they try and tie the statue into the overall story and not just pretend it never existed.

Lastly, in the preview for "Meet Kevin Johnson" in EW, Damon says this:

''Yes, you'll find out a lot about Michael. But you'll ALSO learn why bearded Jack was unable to jump.

Oh snap! I should have connected those dots, but that's just awesome. Guess the Island knows the only way to prevent Jack from doing something is to put someone else in danger so his overactive hero complex kicks in!

So how powerful is the Island, really? It can certainly manipulate both people and objects and send powerfully real visions in the form of dead people. Is there anything it can't do? If I wanted a turkey sandwich on rye bread with lettuce AND mustard (no zombie turkey) could it make one appear, like right now? You have to think the standard genie wish caveats apply - can't kill anyone directly (although it can make someone get into a car crash apparently), make someone fall in love, etc. Is this a function of the Magic Box? Can Ben manipulate it or is it an independent entity?

Whatcha think? And what will you be occupying yourself with on Thursday? =)

One more thing: I have no idea how I missed this too: Lost Madness! I voted for Desmond in the finale though. Big tip o' the hat to M.M. =)

Lost Episode Review 4.08: "Meet Kevin Johnson"

Quote: "No matter how bad you want to... no matter how many ways you try to make it happen... the Island won't let you."

Whoa. Okay, I certainly didn't expect Karl and Danielle to get shot, especially the latter considering we haven't heard her story yet. I actually screamed "NO!" and jumped off the couch when she went down. Of course, Danielle may not be dead - again because of the story angle, but also because the episode wasn't hyped as "two people will die" (*sigh*). Here's hoping Danielle pulls through.

As far as the rest of the episode goes, there's so much to talk about I'm going to do this review a bit differently. Instead of questions, let's go through five categories of stuff that happened:

1. Things I loved about this episode

A) Dead people on parade - Libby, Tom, Naomi, Minkowski. Great to see them all get more face time, especially...

B) Tom - He was finally revealed as being gay, gets to hang out with Arturo in a swank setup in Manhattan and really gets his best episode of the entire show, all this despite being dead! M.C. Gainey deserves big props for his performance too.

C) Sayid's return to form - If there's one thing I love about the original Losties this season, it's Sayid's return to the competent, lethal soldier we've come to know and love. He pursued Michael until he cornered him, got him to spill the beans and then, when he found out Michael was working for Ben, turned him into the Captain.

Turning Michael in to the Captain may have been the wrong thing to do in terms of what we know about the future, but it was exactly what his character should have done. And I love how Sayid, who previously said the day he worked for Ben would be the day "he sold his soul," is really making his own bed with Ben by setting in motion the events that will eventually turn him into Ben's personal assassin. Delicious.

D) The Island - I'll address this below, but I loved how the Island (or Jacob) is able to manipulate things in the outside world.

2. Things which seem really implausible to me

As much as I loved this episode there were a few things which just didn't seem to make sense. And while I enjoyed the episode overall, they were distracting enough that they took away from what was a riveting story from start to finish.

A) How the heck did Michael get back to New York? - He had no money, no identification, a tiny boat and likely a limited amount of food and gas. The only thing I can think of is that one of Ben's men met him in Fiji and out him and Walt on a plane to New York. But that certainly wasn't part of Ben's original bargain and Ben certainly hasn't been inclined to give freebies.

B) The timeline - Michael left the island at the end of November and ended up in New York shortly (days) afterwards. He spent about two to three weeks in New York before Tom contacted him and put him on a plane to Fiji. Fine. But Tom is supposed to be able to bounce around the world between offering Kate a new dress (Tale of Two Cities) and playing football with Jack (Par Avion)? Really?

C) Michael on the freighter - I brought this up last week, but don't evil magnates conduct background checks? How the heck did Ben get Michael onto his arch-rival's ship AND manage to ship him a bomb without any questions begin asked? If Charles Widmore is the super-villain of the show, I've very disappointed with his sloppiness.

D) Ben doesn't kill innocents? - Really? So everyone in DHARMA was evil? Or does it just not count unless Ben does the actual killing himself? Maybe Ben just uses it as self-justification to help him sleep at night, but I laughed out loud when Ben said that to Michael.

To be fair, Ben could have alerted certain people in DHARMA to what was going to happen (like Annie) beforehand. But still this is a stretch. And I guess this would rule out Charlotte as one of the "innocent people" on the freighter, considering Ben tried to kill her himself, eh?

3. Questions that were answered

My nitpicks aside, the show did tie up a lot of loose ends. We learned:

A) What happened to Michael and Walt - Self-explanatory

B) How Michael got on Widmore's ship - Ditto

C) How Ben knew who Charlotte was - Michael presumably sent him her name

D) That the time difference between on-island and off-island was negligible when Michael left - It was pretty negligible when Daniel did his first experiment too, but it's nice to confirm it again even further in the past

E) Widmore staged the fake plane wreck and got the bodies from a cemetery in Thailand - This is still a bit of he said/he said between Ben and Charles, but the evidence Tom provided for Michael looked pretty definitive in terms of the show. Ben was right, and Charles seems to be the bad guy here.

F) Aaron really is the final member of the Oceanic 6 - We learned this in the preview clip rather than the episode, but it's still nice to see it confirmed.

4. Questions that were raised

A) So is Libby = Charlie that visited Hurley?

Whether it's the Island or Jacob, it appears that It has an incredibly long reach, is able to not only impersonate dead people, but also influence events on the other side of the world. In some respects, I imagine this is why all of the Oceanic Six begin going downhill. Hurley started seeing visions, so maybe they all starting feeling the pull to come back eventually. And it seems teh Island can do more than simply contact people and mess with their minds. I guess the only question is why it takes two and a half years to make Jack see the light?

B) Is the Temple really a DHARMA Station?

I'd be shocked by this if true, since I thought the Temple was a sacred place of the island natives. But I think what may have happened is that DHARMA took over that sacred place to study its properties and that's part of the reason why the Others killed all of them. If there's one sure-fire way to piss people off in this world, it's messing with their holy land.



C) Who shot Danielle and Karl?

My guess: Frank brought a chopper of guys with guns to the Island.

D) So why does Walt appear older on the island?

He certainly wasn't older in the episode (from both his grandmother's behavior and the fact we didn't see him up close). So does he eventually get sent back in time?

E) Did Daniel really inactivate the gas? Did they do it on their own?

I'm kinda puzzled by this now. If Daniel and Charlotte are working for Widmore and he wants to kill everyone on the island, why did they inactivate the gas? Was it for self-preservation? Were they really doing it on Charles' orders? Were they really afraid Ben was going to use it instead? But Ben doesn't kill innocents, right? =)

5. Other Tidbits

This episode had so many little touches that I loved:

* Michael pawning Jin's watch - The ODI has a translation of the back.

* Mama Cass showing up with a new song, "It's Getting Better"

* "I brought some extra blankets"

* The EXECUTE button on the bomb

* A reference to "The Shining"

* "You have work to do" - Island life is so hard! =)

Summary: Implausibilities aside, a pretty good finish to the original first half of the season, doncha think? And I was pleased that none of our main cast members died. I now hope that Danielle will prove to be alive, get bandaged up and get locked up together with Alex where she'll have ample time to tell her (and us) her story. I'm also glad Michael wasn't killed so soon (raise your hand if you thought the Captain was going to shoot him at the end. I did). I'm giving this a 4/5 - it certainly filled in a bunch of gaps and would be rated higher if it wasn't for the logical stretches it seemd to take. Now we have five long weeks until the next one. Thank God baseball season is starting. =)

Are Your Final Bets In?

No, not for your NCAA bracket, but rather to guess who's going to die tonight on Lost. I think I'm still sticking with Claire. Her story's pretty much told, we know something has to happen to her since Kate's got Aaron and Jin just seems too obvious at this point.

My other possibilities, in order of likelihood: Jin (the obvious is sometimes right), Michael (it's his episode), Juliet (she just had a flashback, we know pretty much all her story), Desmond (he's on the freighter, can't be one of the O6) or some minor character that we care about (Rose/Bernard/Alex/Karl). I'd be shocked if it was one of the new guys since we know so little about them and they'd have so much less of an impact than one of the cast staples.

I have to admit I'm going to be sad no matter who dies - there's really no one I dislike on the show right now. But if it's Juliet I'll be really sad we'll have no more Elizabeth Mitchell and if it's Desmond I'll just be supremely pissed.

So who do y'all think it is? If you happen to know, BTW, please don't spoil anything. Happy LOST day, everyone! =)

Lost Episode Review 4.07: "Ji Yeon"

Quote: "I named her Ji Yeon, just like you wanted."

Tricksy writers. I should have seen it coming - the cell phone, the Year of the Dragon, the odd disconnect between the two stories. But I was still totally surprised at the end to see that we had a weird mutant flashback/flashforward episode hybrid. Honestly, it kinda annoyed me a bit when I realized what was going on, but after a night to let it simmer I really did enjoy the episode as a whole and I can totally understand why the writers presented it in this fashion.

Couple things I loved about this episode:

Bernard! - He's alive! And still oddly touching as only Bernard and Rose can be. Loved the scene with him and Jin. Nice to get clarification too as to Rose's motivations for staying with Jack.

Jin vs. The Panda - I have to admit when I initially thought Jin was having a flashforward, I thought it was the dumbest one ever. Sayid becomes an assassin in the future and Jin becomes comic relief? Once I realized it was a flashback though, I kinda melted. Interesting to see how benign Jin's job started out, before Sun asked her Dad to pay off her blackmailer. Sun really is the one with all the bad karma in the relationship, not Jin.

Jin and Sun talking baby names - Okay, so Des and Penny aren't the only good couple on the show.

Hurley in a suit - Stylin'!

And I guess we are getting the eighth episode next week. Can't complain! On to the questions:

1. Is Charles Widmore really the bad guy, Part II.

So, according to the Captain, Charles Widmore went to great expense to recover the black box from Oceanic 815 and found it was a fake, as were all the 324 bodies on board and that's why they want Ben. Thus he's implying that Ben himself had the power and wealth, presumably through his contacts in the outside world, to stage the entire hoax within a month (or two) of the actual crash. Impressive to say the least.

Now the rub here is that Michael, who's working for Ben, told Sayid and Desmond not to trust the Captain. Furthermore, during Find 815 back in January, we found out that a shady organization called The Maxwell Group appeared to be behind the fake wreckage. However, The Maxwell Group happens to be a subsidiary of... DUM, DUM, DUM... Widmore Industries!

So who do we believe here? Who's the bad guy, Ben or Charles Widmore? Bottom line is that we still know Sayid is willing to kill for Ben in the future. Regardless of everything he's done, that to me says Ben is doing (or at least thinks he's doing) what's best for the island and possibly the world. And that would make the Captain a liar.

2. So how did Michael infiltrate the ship?

Michael's only been gone from the island for about a month. So how did he end up infiltrating the freighter for Ben to such a point that the crew, who know they have a saboteur on board, don't even suspect him? Remember that back in "Live Together, Die Alone" Ben told Michael to keep to a bearing of 325 if he wanted to escape. However Frank's cheat sheet he had in the chopper states he had to keep to a compass bearing of 305 in order to pilot off the island safely. Did Ben set Michael up to send him back in time or something? It would certainly explain why Walt looks older and how he was able to get onto the freighter.

Furthermore, where the heck is Walt? Did Ben TAKE HIS SON again? It's so nice to be able to make Michael jokes again. =)

3. So is Jin really truly dead?

Jin's tombstone. Thanks to the ODI for the capture:

Jin's DoD here is September 22nd, 2004, the original date of the crash, not a future date. Thus, while we now know he's not part of the Oceanic 6, it possible he's still alive on the island and grave's only a marker. Of course, Hurley's "let's go visit him" comment implies otherwise, but it's something to keep in mind. Especially considering....

4. Uh, so who's gonna die next episode?

*begin rant*

Memo to ABC ad execs: Please stop promoting episodes of LOST where someone dies as if they're special events. They're not. You've been killing characters willy nilly since Season 1. We fail to be surprised anymore. Futhermore...

YOU'RE NOT GOING TO GET NEW VIEWERS BY PROMOTING A DEATH EPISODE! IT'S LAME!

We're going to watch Lost regardless of whether someone dies! New people aren't going to tune in just to see someone die - the cast is too big and it's nothing new on the show! All it succeeds in doing is spoiling the surprise for the rest of us! For the love of god, please don't continue to do this for the last two seasons.

*end rant*
*composes self*

Anyhoo, since we have been told someone's going to die, who's it going to be? After this episode, Jin is the obvious choice. Maybe a little too obvious, though. After all, we know Kate somehow has to become Aaron's custodian meaning Claire's probably going to bite the bullet sometime in the near future. But usually people who are killed get a send off episode and next episode looks to be a Michael flashback. Other possibilities: Desmond (who isn't part of the O6), Juliet (who just got a flashback). Or maybe one of the Fantastic Four. Miles better hang onto that grenade...

5. Where did Frank take the chopper?

If he took it back to the island, Daniel and Charlotte certainly didn't seem to be aware of it, especially since it looked like Daniel has disassembled the phone when Sun went to confront him. But Locke's group didn't have a phone either. Is there another place to land around there? Another island or ship, perhaps? Or was he just going on a scouting mission to make sure no one was heading their way?

Other Tidbits:

* Is the Oceanic 6 now set? I thought we were supposed to know all six by the end of this episode. I may have been wrong about Aaron not counting... (yes, Ev, I admit it)

* 2000 was the Year of the Dragon

* Since Sun is eight weeks pregnant at this point, she likely would have given birth sometime in late June/early July 2005. Thus her flashforward likely takes place well before all the others.

* Nikki's episode of "Expose" was on Sun's TV

* Sun still doesn't seem to trust Jack

* The book Regina was reading was The Survivors of the Chancellor, by Jules Verne. Incidentally, think Regina might be the mysterious "R.G." who inscribed Naomi's bracelet? If she and Naomi were lovers, it would certainly give her more motivation to kill herself.

Summary: Props to the writers for the neato twist, which surprisingly wasn't Michael. Loved a lot of the little things this episode too and Jin/Sun were both fabulous. 4.0/5

Teh Funnay... It Hurts Like A Bleeding Kidney

I'm usually behind the curve when it comes to keeping up with these sorts of things, especially since I've never used Live Journal and don't keep up with all the community chatter, but Rachel's Lost Recaps are one of the funniest Lost related things I've seen online and her blog is simply a cornucopia of hilarious Lost-related goodness from LJ fans. For example:

Awesome (thanks to prettybutt)! She also had a link to the silly, yet always giggle-inducing Jackface link too. I stumbled across that page before during my thesis coma, but forgot to link it. Anyway, check it all out, but be sure you allot some significant time. I still have to go back and read all the recaps (make sure you read The Constant though).

And a big old Tip O' The Hat to Hannah, who steered me in Rachel's direction. Happy Lost day, everyone! =)

The Discharge and the Sickness

Sorry for the unnecessary gross title. I really just couldn't help myself. =)

Anyhoo I'm back from Virginia! This week's review will be up on Friday and I'll be posting fairly regularly during the break as well.

Couple things I've meant to mention in the last couple reviews. First off, do any of you guys usually watch the Pop-Up Video re-hash of the previous episode every Thursday? Usually I'm too busy doing laundry or cooking dinner to really pay close attention. But last week I sat and watched all of "The Constant" again from start to finish and one little tidbit stood out to me. When Daniel zapped Eloise with the giant purple hairdryer, this popped up on the screen (I'm paraphrasing here):

The purple radiation Daniel is using parallels when the sky turned purple after the explosion of the Hatch

I probably should have picked up on that, but for some reason I was more focused on the Slaughterhouse 5 reference. So I guess the question here is whether this means that the island is now "unstuck in time" or not? Obviously something is wrong with time between the island the outside world, but is it going to, say, jump forward 10-20 years all of a sudden now? Interesting thought, eh?

The other thing I wanted to point out was this tidbit buried in Doc Jensen's preview of "The Other Woman"

I tip my hat to Lost blogger Vozzek69 (at darkufo.blogspot.com) and some of my own readers for catching this one: It seems most likely that the time-travel illness that killed Minkowski is the same mythical ''sickness'' that killed The French Lady's fellow scientists wayyy back in the day. I really love this idea. I was never fond of the idea that ''the sickness'' was a Dharma hoax. It just didn't feel right. But this — this feels right. And if it is right, I love it even more for the way this answer was basically left for us to puzzle out, as opposed to having some dude explain it all to us. I expect that in the coming episodes and seasons, more Lost mysteries will be resolved this way.

This just makes a ton of sense. We know that the DHARMA sickness (the reason QUARANTINE was written on the back of certain DHARMA station doors) was a hoax, both from the Lost Puzzle clues and from Kelvin. But it always puzzled me that Danielle still killed her entire team because she thought they were sick. Thus there really did seem to be something about the island that drove her men insane, something that she never contracted in her 16 years and something that none of the Losties contracted either. Considering she and her team were all scientists, it's possible they all were exposed to enough radiation or electromagnetism to also unstick them in time and make Danielle put them out of their misery. It also would explain why we've never gotten a Danielle flashback - if we did it would have given too much away at too early a point in the storyline.

Thoughts on all this? Can't wait for tomorrow! =)

Blogger Experiments...

If the site looks a bit funky over the next couple days, it's because I'm playing around with a number of web thingys, including Google Ads. I'm not sure whether I'll keep them or not, but I do like the Google Search button that allows you not only to just search the web, but allows you to specifically search either my site or Lostpedia too!

If the ads are annoying, let me know. Likewise, if the site is loading funny let me know. Since I started this blog I've experimented with a few things to try and drive web traffic including Stumble Upon (pretty good if you get it right), Blogrush (sucks) and Metatube (sucks). Of course, a Fark link would be great, but really hard to get unless you have a great post. I think I'm going to write an extended review on all of these things during our mid-season hiatus.

But anyhoo, just let me know if 1) the ads are annoying 2) the Google search is useful and 3) anything looks funky in general. Oh, and if you feel like clicking on the ads, well that's all good too. =)

24 hrs. 'til "The Other Woman" people! =)

Lost Link Dump

Happy Monday! (If there is such a thing)

Few things I've been meaning to point out to everyone:

1) Looks like some of Evangeline Lilly's co-stars are getting tired of her behind-the-scenes antics.

"They like to come up with gruesome scenarios for her character's demise," says the tipster.

Sounds like a Fark photoshop contest to me. (speaking of which, don't miss this one - best I've seen in a long, long time).

2) Great article in the Boston Globe on Lost and time travel.

3) Memphish has a not-to-be-missed post up on similarities between Lost and Slaughterhouse 5.

4) The voting's not done yet, but so far TV.com readers have given "The Constant" a 9.8, making it their #1 ranked episode. These rankings tend to come down over time, but it's still likely to remain in the Top 10.

5) Ben Lundy has some LOST inspired silliness over at the Lost Elders (which I do hope to get a post or two up over there soon, should my schedule allow).

6) Cool LOST caricatures! I saw these awhile ago, but *ahem* lost the URL I had bookmarked. Anyhoo I StumbledUpon it again and now I have a new avatar! =)

I don't think I could be more excited for this Thursday! Woo hoo!