Lost--Season 6 - Spoilers Abound!!!

[Worm of Despite]

And the notion of Mr. Loophole having "mother issues".

Why "Mr. Loophole"? Just interested. I'll bet you gave a reason earlier, but I can be bothered to sift through posts. I'd get, ahem, Lost.

[Kil Tyme]

Things moved, but nothing happened. Just yet more characters. I was a bit disappointed.

Agreed. It was a yawner. Nothing to contribute. Claire forgave Kate was the only new movement, big whoop; and we already knew charles was coming. wtf else happened?

[Worm of Despite]

I thought it was funny that Kate, after thinking aloud, "How are we going to fly a plane?!" was answered by Sawyer saying they'd use the submarine. As if subs are so much more user-friendly.

[I'm Murrin]

It was an excuse for one of those "We're not gonna do x, we're gonna do y" moments, which they love so much. We got it twice in one episode back in season 3: "I'm not here for Jack. I'm here for the sub." "I'm not going to steal it. I'm going to blow it up."

[ItisWritten]

And the notion of Mr. Loophole having "mother issues".

The thing about mommy issues, if he hasn't cleared them by now, he never will. It's a curious coincidence that Flocke and Locke both had crazy mommas.

I don't think we can rule out Widmore's killing the survivors, just because he denied responsibility. Glassesgirl (Zoe?) was the one who dragged the bodies away, and she's certainly Widmore's. I can't imagine Widmore cleaning up someone elses bodies.

Well, she said she dragged them away, but that was for Sawyer's benefit. I'm pretty sure she had help. I think her explanation fits, though it's more likely just to clear the bodies away from the plane.

I think La Fleur is just a reminder that Sawyer is the same guy, just with a different shade of gray on his moralities.

Some call him Loophole because he needed one to kill Jacob. The line, "I see you found your loophole," came from Jacob in the S5 finale.

[Zarathustra]

On the issue of "nothing happened," I think there is a danger of expecting the sideways flashes to be merely incidental, when they really could be the entire point. I believe we're already seeing how these characters end up. It's possible that this alternate timeline will be the "real" timeline, and what we're seeing now on the island will be "discarded," or otherwise "collapse," or something. So whether or not anything happened really should be addressed to the sideflashes. In that regard, learning that Sawyer could have been a cop under alternate circumstances is quite a revelation. That's a pretty big character moment.

Of course, we all want answers about the island, too. But answers are different from "something happening."

I admit that there is something unsatisfying about the approach the writers have taken this season. It seems like they didn't really have a lot to say after all. But I can't think of a better way to show how our characters end up off the island while simultaneously tying up loose ends on the island. If the entire season had been on the island, we'd never know how they ended up, and there would would be a sense of characters being unresolved. Or, if they all got off the island before the end, it would seem anticlimactic. This is the best of both worlds.

[Harbinger]

I, for one, was cheering, "Go Claire, go Claire!" as the knife descended.

[Kil Tyme]

I'm throwing the BS flag on the whole flash sideways crap. If they had to have this gimmick as part of the last season, it would have been better to just show their lives as if there was no island and the plane never crashed rather than if the plane never crashed and they landed in bizarro world. I understand they are trying to show alternate what-ifs in order to comment on the 180s possible in life if things were different, but I still think it is stupid to have Jack suddenly have a kid, Sawyer to now be a cop rather than a thug, Ben be a moralistic teacher instead of the scheming boob we’ve all grown to love. Along that line of reasoning by the writers, then why isn't Sayid instead a happy-go-lucky tire salesmen who is married to the love of his life and why isn't Kate a nun? And anyone who was anyone on the island all happen to live in LA?! I'm waiting to see a shot of Vincent the Dog roam the streets of LA on Lennon the interpreters leash. Sawyer and Miles cop partners? It’s all like a dream Gilligan of Gilligan’s Island would have where Ginger and Mary Ann are scheming sisters with Lovie as their Mom who run afoul of The Skipper and The Professor Detective Agency who are busy looking for Thurston Howell doing a hammed up version of Snidely Whiplash. The flash sideways are a stupid gimmick used cause they have just run out of Lost Island-centric ideas and need a filler while they decide how to really end the show. They are a big flipping waste of time.

[lucimay]

only scanned this page of posts but i'm obviously the only person who dug this episode! fond of cop stories.
i love sawyer in a badge and not much else! WOOT!!

and whoever said up page that the sideways flashes might be the point, i'm definitely leanin that way after this ep. for why i can't tell you.
i'm not dissecting as i watch, only just watching the story and enjoying it, cliche dialogue and all.

i want a tshirt that says "i conned james ford outa this stupid tshirt"

serrously.

[I'm Murrin]

It could just all be setup, though they really should have made that more clear by now. The problem, I think, is that there's been no follow up on any of the sideways storylines yet. Each has had one episode, and no more (what worked with the old flashbacks fails when you're dealing with significantly altered characters whose stories don't directly connect with the other plots). Now with Kate running into Sawyer, and Sayid being in Jin's story, we might finally get some progression.

[ItisWritten]

It could just all be setup, though they really should have made that more clear by now. The problem, I think, is that there's been no follow up on any of the sideways storylines yet. Each has had one episode, and no more (what worked with the old flashbacks fails when you're dealing with significantly altered characters whose stories don't directly connect with the other plots). Now with Kate running into Sawyer, and Sayid being in Jin's story, we might finally get some progression.

Why would they be clear now, when they've rarely been clear on anything for 5 seasons? Up to now (S6), the writers have just been parring every hole.

There's been overlap in all the sideways (except Jack's). Claire in Kate's; Hurley and Ben in Locke's; Locke in Ben's; and we're still due Jin and Sun and Hurley.

But forget all that. The next ep is the one that must be knocked out of the park. Or at least off the wall. I know some of us avoid previews, but if you don't know the Richard episode is coming ... well, you must have been on the moon. Or in the hold of a slave ship.

[Cagliostro]

Yeah, I'm hopping up and down about the next one. It should be a lulu, and hopefully this will be the info dump we have been waiting for.

[Vraith]

There's been overlap in all the sideways (except Jack's). Claire in Kate's; Hurley and Ben in Locke's; Locke in Ben's; and we're still due Jin and Sun and Hurley.

Wasn't Locke in Jack's? I know Dogen was, but he's not Oceanic so isn't quite the same.
The overlapping of char's. lives in interesting to me. One of my first philosophy classes, the Prof. said, "People tend to get upset when Law seems too rigid, but at some point it has to be rigid, otherwise it isn't a law, it's a suggestion." That's sort of how I'm seeing the char's destinies...for any timeline, these char's were going to have overlapping lives/kinds of choices. Certain limits, but not determination. "Anexact, yet rigorous" [can't recall who I'm stealing that from]
Right now I'm seeing the whole island as kinda schrodinger's cat: there/not there, and how it collapses into decision depends on if Flocke escapes or not.

[Zarathustra]

Right now I'm seeing the whole island as kinda schrodinger's cat: there/not there, and how it collapses into decision depends on if Flocke escapes or not.

Yes! I think so, too.

However, Widmore (and his people) seem to be an anomaly. Are they from the sideways flash? Or from the original? If he's from the original, does that mean there's also a "sideways Widmore?" But how can that be possible when he left the island long before the 1977 incident? The lives that were changed (in the sideflashes) are only the ones who were already on the island when the incident happened (Jack, Sawyer, etc.) and those who were on the island when the people from 1977 came back to 2007 (Ben, Sun, etc.). How could the events of 1977 possibly affect Widmore's life if he had no involvement in the island at that time?

Maybe his arrival is part of what "collapses" the cat.

[I'm Murrin]

Widmore was on the island when the Incident occured. We saw him on the day it happened, in the events around Faraday's death. He and Eloise seemed to hold a joint leadership position, which he held wholly after she left to have Daniel, up until Ben ousted him.

But I don't see why you think only the lives of people on the island changed.

[sindatur]

Right now I'm seeing the whole island as kinda schrodinger's cat: there/not there, and how it collapses into decision depends on if Flocke escapes or not.

Yes! I think so, too.

However, Widmore (and his people) seem to be an anomaly. Are they from the sideways flash? Or from the original? If he's from the original, does that mean there's also a "sideways Widmore?" But how can that be possible when he left the island long before the 1977 incident? The lives that were changed (in the sideflashes) are only the ones who were already on the island when the incident happened (Jack, Sawyer, etc.) and those who were on the island when the people from 1977 came back to 2007 (Ben, Sun, etc.). How could the events of 1977 possibly affect Widmore's life if he had no involvement in the island at that time?

Maybe his arrival is part of what "collapses" the cat.

The whole planet could be affected by the incident. Anyone who came in contact with someone who's life was influenced could be influenced to have different things happen. IE: What different decisions would Widmore have made if he didn't interact with Desmond at all or if certain interactions with Desmond went differently. Or Mrs Hawkings, maybe she didn't influence him in certain ways because she wasn't pushing Desmond and Daniel towards their destinies?

[wayfriend]

I don't see the alternate timeline as a quantum physics thing. I see it as an alternate reality. My impression of why the alternate timeline is important is that someone/somemany from THAT timeline will somehow be critical to resolve the storyline in THIS timeline, through some sort of crossover.

I can't help but think that Joshua must somehow be alive and well in the alternate timeline. And he must know what's going on. He might very well "touch" his candidates in the alternate reality again (if you will allow) and enlist their aid. Locke would be in a particularly good position as he has so much to gain and he has no possibility of meeting himself (if you will allow) if he crosses over. Just imagine - Locke facing off with Flocke!

Richard apparently arrived as a slave or prisoner on that ship. The bargain he made with Jacob is fairly easy to guess. But still, THERE'S a flashback I'd like to see.

I think I get my wish, next week!

[I'm Murrin]

Ab Aeterno:

Literally, "from the everlasting" or "from eternity". Thus, "from time immemorial", "since the beginning of time" or "from an infinitely remote time in the past". In theology, often indicates something, such as the universe, that was created outside of time.

[Zarathustra]

Widmore was on the island when the Incident occured. We saw him on the day it happened, in the events around Faraday's death. He and Eloise seemed to hold a joint leadership position, which he held wholly after she left to have Daniel, up until Ben ousted him.

<smacks forehead> How silly of me. You're right. I forgot.

But I don't see why you think only the lives of people on the island changed.

Because an island disappearing on the other side of the planet wouldn't affect me if I hadn't been on the island when it disappeared. I understand the possibility of a "Butterfly Effect," but that's just a complex chain of direct causation. It doesn't magically affect everyone instantaneously.

There are two possibilities, here. Either the 2007 island people are in some kind of spacetime "bubble," and there's not an external "original timeline" world outside the island. Or there are two earths (possibly two universes), one with our original timeline characters, and one with the alternate timeline characters. In other words, reality split in two at the Incident. That's certainly one interpretation of the Schrodenger's Cat paradox, that a dead cat and a live cat exist simultaneously in two different universes. But there are other interpretations as well, such as measurement (external interference with a closed system) "collapsing" a dual-state into one.

I don't see the alternate timeline as a quantum physics thing. I see it as an alternate reality. My impression of why the alternate timeline is important is that someone/somemany from THAT timeline will somehow be critical to resolve the storyline in THIS timeline, through some sort of crossover.

Interesting. I'm not sure the difference between alternate timeline and alternate reality is important, because in practice they could amount to the same thing. An alt-time would be an alt-reality. (Or maybe I'm missing something. It happens. See above. )

The events we're seeing in the sideflashes seem to be "covering up" or "redoing" events that already happened in the original timeline. It's not like reality split into two paths and then they diverged without crossing; it seems that reality would have to have split in such a way that one path covered terrority already laid down in the other (i.e. 1977-2004, so far). Up until 1977, we've been given no indication that there was any difference between the two "realities," or if there even were two realities. It certainly seems plausible to suppose the dual situation we have now was caused by time travel of season 5 (in other words, an alt-timeline).

As for someone from the alt-time being crucial, I think you might be right. Could be Desmond.

[ItisWritten]

There's been overlap in all the sideways (except Jack's). Claire in Kate's; Hurley and Ben in Locke's; Locke in Ben's; and we're still due Jin and Sun and Hurley.

Wasn't Locke in Jack's? I know Dogen was, but he's not Oceanic so isn't quite the same.
The overlapping of char's. lives in interesting to me. One of my first philosophy classes, the Prof. said, "People tend to get upset when Law seems too rigid, but at some point it has to be rigid, otherwise it isn't a law, it's a suggestion." That's sort of how I'm seeing the char's destinies...for any timeline, these char's were going to have overlapping lives/kinds of choices. Certain limits, but not determination. "Anexact, yet rigorous" [can't recall who I'm stealing that from]
Right now I'm seeing the whole island as kinda schrodinger's cat: there/not there, and how it collapses into decision depends on if Flocke escapes or not.

Jack and Locke met in the season opener, LA X, but not in Lighthouse. There was a mention of Claire (Littleton) when reading Christian's will, but that's the closest to an overlap there.

Z, this show is as complicated as it gets. I have to put my full attention on the timeline crap every time. *Stares at nothing* And doing that isn't very productive, especially at work.

If Widmore and Eloise Hawking were on the island, then there probably wouldn't be a Daniel Farraday, maybe no Penny either, which makes Desmond's appearance on 815 more curious.