Many spoilers ahead. If you have not watched all of LOST include last night’s episode, “Recon,†you should move along. There’s nothing to see here.
I’m not above admitting that LOST is fallible. Sometimes (Kate) the people responsible for this show give us episodes (“Eggtown,” “What Kate Did,” the first act of season 3) that make me scratch my head and wonder how a program of such high quality can go so wrong. I had this feeling a few times last night as I watched “Recon.” First of all, I’m growing weary of the sideways flashes. With only 8 episodes remaining, I find myself groaning (occasionally aloud) when I hear the now-familiar sounds of that wonky jet engine which precedes each skewed glance at this “alternate reality” or “epilogue” or whatever they are. Make up your own theories. I’m beyond caring at this point.
I guess, if we are to glean anything from the sideways universe, it is that all our characters are going to come together at John Locke’s wedding. And maybe the Smoke Monster will show up, and that’s where the big war will occur. This is the best hope I have for tying in this storyline in a way that would be, you know…cool. Because they’re such a waste of time. At this point they take way too much time away from the island life. I don’t care about Sawyer eating a microwavable dinner and watching Little House On The Prairie. I want to see a longer scene between him and Widmore in the bowels of that submarine, sharing intel about the impending battle. I understand the logic behind saving important information from us in order to build up more intrigue and offer a satisfying payoff in the end, but even if that is the intent of the show’s producers, why not use this time to answer some smaller questions? If Widmore doesn’t want to answer any of the big questions, what’s to stop him from giving us an update on Eloise Hawking or Penny and Desmond? At least concluding those plotlines in passing is providing a conclusion. Having Widmore sit there and say literally nothing in what was supposed to be one of the climactic scenes of the episode was downright annoying.
Here’s the thing. We heard Widmore tell John Locke at the hospital in Tunisia “A war is coming.” So we know that Widmore has had knowledge of this conflict for (I imagine) a very long time. Now he’s stationed at Hydra island, preparing his army for battle. And apparently he expected Sawyer to saunter into his submarine so they could make a pact? Are we ever going to find out a) how he knows all this information, or b) whether he has more information — future information — that he is keeping hidden? And what was up with him teasing us with his response to Sawyer’s comment about sending a boat of mercenaries to kill everybody. If he was going to go so far as to offer a minor denial, why couldn’t he follow that up with one single sentence explaining his denial? That’s just retarded. The mystique of Charles Widmore has to be the worst tug job LOST has given viewers. No, wait. Walt. What the fuck is that all about? Still, can we get a few more lines out of Widmore, please? PLEASE?
One cool moment from last night included the conversation between MIB/Locke and Kate on the beach near where his dark army has set up camp. I defy you to conjure another thematic issue on LOST that has been discussed more than “Daddy issues.” Now we can add “Mommy issues” to that ever-expanding list of themes. Most of the analysis and critique of “Recon” I have read wonders if MIB/Locke is Aaron, or Farraday (really, Doc Jensen? That’s retarded), or Cain or Abel, this historical figure or that, so on and so forth, ad infinitum. One of the biggest questions surrounding the entity that now calls John Locke home is his name. The show has taken great strides to hide this very valuable information from us since his introduction. Even when he says, “Nice talking to you Jacob,” the response is, “Nice talking to you too.” This is going to be a major reveal when we hear it spoken for the first time. And though it would be kind of a bummer to have him revealed with a name like Cerebus or Azazel would be a major bummer, I have a hard time conjuring a person we know from the show who could possibly be revealed to be the real MIB. Aaron seems like a logical choice for those who want to make him somebody we already know, but the amount of information that would need to be unpacked in order to make it work seems too vast. I don’t like the idea of a devil or foreign angel. I definitely don’t like the idea of his being an alien. That pretty much leaves us with a real life human being…so who is he? I haven’t fully committed myself to a single theory yet. I’m wondering if maybe he is someone who exists (or has existed) in the reality presented by the sideways flashes. It would be a nice and easy solution to reconciling the two timelines if the goal of the Man In Black is to return to the universe as it exists in sideways reality. What role his character has played or will play in the sideways universe remains to be seen, but to me this feels like the most realistic option for neatly tying together the island world to the otherwise boring world we keep seeing in flashes every week.
I had fun watching Claire nearly kill Kate. It will be awesome when Kate turns around and kills Claire, too. I liked Kate (gasp!) not touching the Man In Black when he offered her his hand to help her to her feet. LOST has taken great strides to show us repeatedly the instances when castaways were touched by Jacob. Could MIB have a similar effect on those he’s touched? Bear in mind he’s touched Sawyer (by helping him descend into the numbers/names cave), Claire (he hit her in the fucking face last night, but I assume he’s touched her before…no, not in that way), and Sayid touched him (via hand on shoulder as he drove sword into his gut). Still, there was one pressing question that weighed heavily on my mind after the episode ended last night. It was a question that my little LOST party crew debated post-“Recon,” and continues to debate in our weekly e-mail chain. To paraphrase Brad Pitt’s character in the David Fincher film Se7en: “What’s in the room? WHAT’S IN THE FUCKING ROOM!?”
As I see it, everyone assumes “it” is a person, not a thing. So, let’s play LOST scientist and theorize who could be concealed behind the padlocked door in Widmore’s submarine:
– Walt! – This is a pipe dream. I know it, you know it, everybody knows it. We will probably never see Walt again in a new episode of LOST. But can you imagine how insane it would be if his special powers were capable of thwarting the man in black? And maybe he’d swim from Hydra island over to main island in order to do it. You know, because Walt’s greatest moments occur when he’s soaking wet. I hate that we will never have closure with his story. LOST is one month from completing production, and we’ve been really lucky that none of the main actors died between 2004 and 2010. The greatest misfortune to befall the show was Malcolm David Kelley’s growth spurt, which rendered Walt pretty much useless. I always believed that fans would not care if they recast Walt to keep him on the show, but I guess that’s why I watch TV instead of making TV. Okay, so let’s put the odds of Walt behind behind the padlocked door at a (depressing) 200:1.
– Theresa – I know what you’re saying: who the fuck is Theresa? I had a great chuckle this morning when a perhaps braindead Doc Jensen offered his theory that the MIB is actually Daniel Farraday, and Charles Widmore is hiding Theresa Spencer on his submarine. I don’t understand this at all. In fact, I rarely understand what Jensen has to say anymore. Someone needs to remind him that he’s supposed to be analyzing and reviewing a television program, not mentally masturbating himself by making arcane literary connections between non-crucial LOST moments and canonic texts. I actually laughed aloud when I tried to imagine Widmore unlocking the door and introducing a woman who is for all intents and purposes a complete vegetable as the great weapon for defeating the Man In Black. And she’s laying there on her stretcher hooked up to various life support systems beeping and wheezing and churning. And Hurley just says, “Dude…” Odds of this happening: 10,000,000:1
– Christian Shephard – This is my current theory. The last two seasons have ended with dead body reveals. Season 4 ended with a glimpse of John Locke (aka Jeremy Benthem) resting in a coffin. Season 5 nearly concluded with Ilana dumping the body of John Locke onto the beach near the statue of Taweret. So, why can’t season six include the best dead body reveal of all? Christian fucking Shephard! How amazing would that be? We could learn that number 23 is not Jack Shephard, but Christian. If you want to borrow a lot of the biblical LOST theories involving the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ and its relation to season six, there are only two Christ-like characters that could arise on “Easter Sunday” that would make sense: John Locke and Christian Shephard. My guess is that he will be the resurrected Jacob. The lighthouse that reflected Jack’s childhood home was not meant to show Jack that Jacob was always watching him — Jacob was really watching Christian. The man Jacob wanted Hurley to help come to the island was not Widmore, it was Christian. Jack’s purpose has nothing to do with his being a candidate to replace Jacob, but to shepherd his own father to the island so that he can put an end to this game between Jacob and MIB that has gone on ab aeterno.
How would Widmore get Christian’s body? Here’s how. We know Widmore was on the island as a soldier of sorts after World War II. We know he stayed there after “The Incident,” until the day he was excommunicated by Ben. That means he had nearly 20 years to come in contact with either the spirit of Christian we’ve seen interact with John Locke, Claire, and Jack on the island, or the actual, physical dead body of Christian Shephard. And I’m willing to bet that the ancient mythological “others” on the island have some really good techniques for keeping dead bodies preserved. Nicci thinks I’m grasping at straws here, but I like this theory as much as I like Sawyer eventually killing Hurley (“Dude…”) and as much as I like a potential Jack/Locke Jacob/MIB reiteration ending. Imagine a finale where Jack and his father are the only two entities left on the island. Even the MIB would be dead. That would leave father and son all eternity to hash out their issues and form a real relationship with one another, or, at least until the next plane crash and/or boat running ashore. Eh? EH!? I like the sound of that!
