I’m going to be as eloquent as possible here, okay?
HOLY FUCK, LOST IS BACK!
Last night’s premiere episode, “LA X, parts 1 and 2,” which was #10 on our Top 100 Moments Of Lost, if you didn’t notice, was easily the most anticipated two hours of television this year (so far, at least), right? And, to me, it was extremely satisfying, and in typical Lost fashion, frustrating with the new questions it sets up, and anticipation it builds.
Did Jughead explode and reset the timeline?
The answer is yes! We see our favorite characters right back there on Oceanic flight 815, flying from Sydney to Los Angeles, encountering a bit of turbulence as it soars over the submerged Island we’ve been getting to know so well over the last 5 years.
We see a few familiar faces, and notice some absent ones, and learn that this timeline wasn’t born out of Oceanic 815 not crashing on the Island, it’s was created specifically by the explosion on the Island in 1977.
That’s 30 years of a whole new world to explore, and one that we’ll get to do flash… sideways… backs (technically we’re flashing back to an alternate universe 2004 from 2008, right?) all the while…
We’re in our regular “timeline” on the show, on the Island, with our favorite castaways, and those wacky, crazy Others. Jacob’s dead. Sayid is dead, then not. And the Jacob’s nemesis? Turns out HE IS ACTUALLY THE FUCKING SMOKE MONSTER. And also kind of badass, right?
And more than a little scary, which is, not surprisingly, a nice fit.
High praise should be more than paid to Terry O’Quinn, who has played the broken and weary but always hopeful John Locke so perfectly the past 5 years only to turn it all on it’s head, to be a new character, seemingly evil incarnate with a masterful ability to fool and manipulate. That mad gleam that Locke always had in his eye? Now it’s fully shiny.
And we’ve spoken volumes before about Matthew Fox’s performance as Jack, who’s always been a little broken, a little deranged, and he’s the same here, always feeling hunched over with grief and the vapors of failure that hang over like black Smoke Monster clouds. He just feels like an outsider, in the “real” timeline and in that “sideways” timeline, as he watches Rose and Bernard canoodling across the aisle from him. The only real shine that enters his eyes is his momentary passing Kate on the plane and later when he meets wheelchair-confined alterna-John Locke, a man who did go on his walkabout and maybe feels that bit of hope again when the spinal surgeon tells him nothing’s irreversible.
That looks suspiciously like connective tissue to a looming mystery, friends and readers. That, or Jack really missed a spot when he was shaving his chest.
Also, I would love it if our only glimpses of sideways Charlie are just those as he’s being lead away to jail for trying to kill himself in the airplane bathroom.
RIP Juliet. Oh, and Sawyer and Juliet’s love.
Also, the Others! Well, no just the Others, but the temple dwelling Others. With their leader, Dogen, who only speaks Japanese because English leaves a nasty taste on his tongue, his aide and translator, Lennon (named for the fact that he wears the same glasses as the famous Beatle?), and the return of Cindy and those fucking kids, with their waters of life that are seemingly polluted by their messianic figure’s demise. And with the news of Jacob’s passing, they’re afraid of the rise of the Smoke monster? Isn’t he the security system for the temple? And if he’s a smoke monster, is it possible that Jacob was also a smoke monster in some natural form?
It wouldn’t be a Lost season premiere without new mysterious characters, new mysterious locations, and well… new mystery, right? And also this:
And we’re all here, on the edge of our seats, ready to discover it together. Now, I’ve said too much, way more than I had intended to, but the excitement and the curiosity, it just springs forth. More importantly, what did you think?
I need to watch this episode about three more times. I LOVED evil Locke/Smoke Monster. Terry O’Quinn kills it. He owns every scene he’s in; no mean feat with Michael Emerson in most of them. Loved his “I’m very disappointed in all of you” parting shot.
Nice to see that Sayid has arisen to pass judgement on the living and the dead. Later on I may have more to say about modal realities, Gottfried Liebniz and lists.
PS. All in favor of Jeff Fahey playing every role he gets now in that Pilot’s uniform shirt, say aye!
Aye!!!
Aye
I absolutely want a ridiculously huge hourglass in my domicile now.
And I’m dying to know what the effect/changes of the pool will have on our beloved Sayid. The pool of water that would seemingly have a connection to Jacob, the patron “spirit” of the Others and the waters turn murky, almost bloody looking, so close to his death.
Jeff Fahey has definitely wrapped the the worn and dirty pilot’s outfit into the full Lapidus package, but I wouldn’t mind seeing Fahey’s next role also bring back season 4′s Hawaiian shirt.
And again… let’s say that Jacob and Esau/Smoke Monster/Man in Black/Evil Locke/”Flocke” are of the same… species, for lack of a better word. Let’s say that they’re essentially on the same tier there, then would that mean that Jacob is/was also a Cerberus/”smoke monster?” I mean, there was times when the smoke monster was just quietly judging, and times when he was killing and maiming. We assumed it was some kind of predatory beast/creature, or a security system of the Island/temple, and one SINGLE entity, but what if it was multiple?
And who was that appearing off Island to the various members of the Oceanic 6? Sure, Jacob appeared as Jacob, as we saw in “The Incident,” but when Jack saw his dad back in “Something Nice Back Home?” So many potential things could have been going on there.
I think ultimately it’ll come down to where is this “home” that the evil Locke speaks of?