Rocks In My Dryer

Dang!

I just watched the last five minutes of that episode with my hands over my eyes!  Holy shmokes!

I have felt for a long time that something is amiss where Claire is concerned.  She is too dedicated of a mother to willingly leave Aaron.  If she were separated from him, she would be completely berserk, NOT rocking and smiling in a chair.  Here's the excerpt from an interesting theory on the message boards:

Claire died when her house exploded..the island makes dead people seem like reality, hence Christian Sheppard. Christian took his daughter wherever she belongs (a la the afterlife).

What do you think?  All that time she was hiking across the island with Sawyer and boat guy, she was actually dead?  Plausible?

Another thing--I told Melanie last week (I did!  Ask her!) that I think Christian Shepherd is central to this whole thing.  I'm not sure why or how, but his increasing number of appearances must be significant. 

And back on the boat?  I'm just as lost as I can be.  What in the heck is going on?  Why aren't the captain and Strangely Vicious Military Guy on the same page? 

One last thing.  I thought that the scene where Hurley and Ben shared a candy bar was excellent television.  Perfectly paced at a tense moment.  That is some fine writing.

What a show.

If you're blogging Lost, leave your link below.  Out of consideration for other readers, please link directly to your post, not to the front page of your blog.  Here's how you do it.

*UPDATED--I WATCHED IT!* Tornado Alley

Tornadoes have been rocking my corner of Oklahoma all evening.  That means all local television has been pre-empted so the weather people can act freakishly excited give us all fair warning.  I think the only tragedy greater than having the roof blown off my house is missing an episode of Lost during sweeps month.

Oh, I jest.  But I did actually call the ABC newsroom to find out when they were re-playing Lost, and I chose to ignore the impatient tone of voice in the man who answered the phone.  Clearly, he felt like life-threatening weather situations took priority over television programming.  Seriously?

So, no Lost post tonight until I have a chance to watch it on-line.  In the meantime, if you've posted about it, feel free to leave your link below.  And for Pete's sake, don't leave me any spoilers in the comments section.

(And, in all seriousness, I hope you Okies out there all stayed safe and dry tonight.)

UPDATED TO ADD--

So, I watched it.

Stupid Jack.  Stupid, stupid Jack.  Doesn't he see he's going down the same road as his dad?  And speaking of Jack's dad, is he alive, or isn't he?  Why did he come for Claire?  Is he the un-dead, coming to claim a victim?  Did I really just type that sentence with a straight face?

But let's hear it for the manly men in last night's episode.  Jin calmly threatening to break Daniel's fingers one at a time may be one of my favorite Lost moments ever.  And Sawyer?  You mark my words, he and Claire are getting together.  Unless, of course, she's being held captive by the un-dead.

And dadgummit if Juliet isn't starting to make me her like it again.  I won't do it.  I won't!

"He Changed the Rules."

When tonight's episode was over, Hubs turned to me and said, "So, what can you write about that?" 

It wasn't very tidy, was it?  Let's re-cap what we learned:

-- Boat people were never going to take the Losties off the island.  Not a huge surprise, but at least it's confirmed.

-- Ben is a cold-hearted snake.  Oh wait, we already knew that.  (It was hard to feel much sympathy for him when Alex died, since he seemed, to me, almost directly responsible.  He definitely won't win Daddy Of the Year.)

--  The smoke monster is alive and well.  And wasn't that an interesting twist to find yourself rooting for it?  I thought that was a Great Lost Moment, when it took out the bad guys.

-- Now we know why Sayid has teamed up with Ben, post-island.  He's motivated by revenge. 

-- Every week we learn that the relationship between Ben and Widmore is more complicated (and, it appears, more integral to the plot).  Tonight on the message boards (Yes! I read them!  Geek alert!) someone suggested that perhaps Ben and Widmore are related, kind of a good twin/bad twin thing.  This is a throwback to the book Bad Twin, which was touted in an earlier season by Lost producers as holding some answers.

What am I missing?  Did we learn anything else?

A few more observations:

-- Jack is sick!  What would we do without him?  If the producers kill him off, I'll stop watching.  Oh, who are we kidding, no I won't.  But I'll watch sullenly.

-- Sawyer.  I just love him.  When he was being so protective of Claire, my heart got a little melty.  But I still think he needs a haircut and a bath.

-- My Hubs (who, incidentally, is much cuter than Sawyer, and also has a more impressive committment to personal hygiene) made an interesting observation.  He pointed out that twice Ben referenced Widmore "changing the rules".  What rules?  And who set the rules?

-- You know what?  I have to say that I don't miss the Juliet story lines.   

If you're writing about Lost at your own blog, leave your link below.

*UPDATED* I Must Be Stuck In the Island's Time Warp...

...because here is my Lost post, 24 hours late.  It's the Island's fault.  I swear.

Honestly, I don't have much say.  I thought the only big surprise was the confirmation that Walt and Michael did, indeed, get off the Island the first time.  I didn't see that coming. 

It was very cool to see Libby again (though I was hoping for more of her back story).  And we learned that Michael is even more conflicted than we thought he was.  I can't help but feel sorry for the guy.

The flying arrows (or were those bullets?) in the end were rather shocking, but weren't they just The Others at the temple?  Or would that be too simple an explanation for Lost?

And also, may I just say, in case I haven't said it enough, that SAYID ROCKS.  Love that boy.

*UPDATED TO ADD*  Reader Amanda cleverly pointed out that Alex appears to be wearing an earpiece in the last scene.  You can see a screen shot here.  Was she in on it?

I'm still a little brain-fuzzy, so y'all knock me out with your clever Lost analysis in the comments section below.  If you've written your own Lost post at your blog, feel free to leave a link below.

No Lost Post Tonight...

...because I've just been too busy helping Hubs with taxes this evening.

And by "helping Hubs with taxes" I mean "sitting on the couch next to him with a blank look on my face when he asks where my blogging receipts are and promising to do better next year and trying to distract him from my negligence with some Oreos."

There were numbers involved.  Many, many numbers.  And they had dollar signs!  And (have mercy) decimals!  And I just don't feel like my poor little brain could handle the drama of time warps and tropical polar bears and explosive-laden slave ships. 

So I'm enjoying the benefits of my DVR tonight, and I'll be watching Lost tomorrow, when I'm recovered from all the math.  If I've recovered sufficently, maybe I'll even write a post.

But first?

Oreos. 

Good and Lost *UPDATED*

I told you it was Michael!  I told you it was Michael!

Sorry, just had to get that out of the way.

So, there were lots of questions on tonight's episode, and (surprise!) no answers.

Obviously, Michael is on the boat.  So where is Walt?  Still a prisoner on the island?  (Remember the scene a couple of episodes in which Ben indicated there was a child imprisoned that was causing the birds to fly into the building?)

I guess it's safe to guess that Michael is Ben's spy.  But why?  What is Ben doing to people to bend all these people to his will?

And what about the captain?  Michael says not to trust him, but if Michael is working for Ben, we can't trust what Michael says, right?  (Hang on, I need to go get an Advil.)

GOOD FOR SUN for giving ol' Juliet a whack.  Just when I was starting to trust Juliet, she goes manipulative again.  I don't think we can trust her.  I know, supposedly she was doing it for Sun's protection, but that just doesn't add up to me.  I don't think doctor/patient obligation is so strong that you'd step in to potentially ruin a marriage.

The whole is-Jin-dead-or-not thing is very confusing.  I wonder if that was even Sun's hospital where he visited (remember, they said it was a boy).  That doesn't make a lick of sense.  I wonder if he's suffering the same kind of memory loss that Desmond suffered last week.

Let's re-cap the Oceanic Six:

1. Kate
2. Jack
3. Hurley
4. Baby Aaron
5. Sun (I'm guessing her baby counts along with her?)
6. Sayid

But we know that more people than this got off the island.  Additionally, there is

1. Desmond (assuming he actually makes it off the boat)
2. Jin
3. Ben
4. Whoever Jack visited in the casket (I'm starting to wonder if it's father, "re-dying" back off the island.)
5. Michael

The teaser told us that someone is dying next week.  Who do you think it is?  I have a terrible hunch it's going to be Claire.  Can you imagine her letting anything other than her own death separating her from baby Aaron?  If I'm right, we'd better stock up on the Kleenex before next week.

UPDATED TO ADD: Here are a couple of interesting sneak peeks for next week.

Just for fun, here's a poll to see which character everyone loves the most. I accidentally left off Sun, and the poll won't let me go back and re-edit, so if she's your favorite, just vote Jin.

If you're posting about Lost at your blog this week, leave your link below (please link directly to your post, not to the front page of your blog):

If the Plot Were Any Thicker, It Would Be Cement

So.

Ben said he would tell John who his "man on the boat" was.  I glanced at the clock and said, "Look, Hubs!  There's a whole 21 minutes left in the show!  I think we're actually going to find out who the man on the boat is!"

You'd think I know this show by now.

Twenty-one minutes later and all we have is Ben walking across the lawn with clean sheet and towels.  Well, and then there's me, standing in my living room, shouting "JUST TELL WHO THE MAN ON THE DAD-BLAMED BOAT IS!"

I mean, I know it's Michael.  It has to be.  But I just really need the writers to confirm that for me.

That darn show.  Oh, how they toy with me.  And I just love it.

Here are a few random comments/questions from tonight's show:

What did Ben mean about the rabbit (the one John served him) having a number?  A lab rabbit, I guess?

What is the deal with the creepy therapist appearing in the jungle with the weird voices?  It's those same voices that appear with Walt.  Does this mean the therapist is dead?  Are the voices a sign of some psychic power Ben has to work inside people's minds?

Speaking of Ben, just when I think he can't get any spookier, he does.  He scares me more every week.  Poor Juliet.  I think this is first episode in which I fully sympathized with her.  I didn't trust her, until tonight. 

But holy shmokes, did you see the look of jealousy on her face when Jack tended to Kate's head wound?  If looks could kill, Kate would be a goner.

Early in the episode, the creepy therapist told Juliet, "You look just like her."  Just like whom?  Ben's mom?  Leave it to Ben to have some weird Oedipal complex.

So, if Ben is a bad guy, and his enemy is Widmore, then that would (presumably) make Widmore a good guy.  (See how my simple little mind works?)  But if Widmore is a good guy, then why was he so awful to Desmond?  And what are the WEIRD odds that his daughter's boyfriend would end up stranded on the exact island he was searching for?

Could the whole thing be any more randomly, cosmically, spookily, eerily, wonderfully inter-connected?  Oh how I love this show.

Okay, Losties.  Fire away with your thoughts about tonight's episode.

*UPDATED* No Answers, Big Headache

That wasn't exactly my favorite Lost episode. 

My word, that was confusing.  The episodes that have to do with Desmond always are, it seems (remember the creepy white-haired woman and the monastery from last season?)  I'm not even sure what to say about it except...

My word, that was confusing. 

(But wasn't the phone conversation between Desmond and Penny the sweetest thing ever?  Gotta love a Lost love story.)

That's all I have to say about that.  Your thoughts?

*UPDATED TO ADD*  I think there's something to this Michael/Walt theory several of you raised.  Think about it--those two left the island without knowing where they're going, right?  So they almost certainly veered into the time warp.  Either they got picked up on the ship, or they're floating out there in "lost" time.  MAYBE THIS IS WHY WALT KEEPS REAPPEARING ON THE ISLAND.  That just almost makes sense!

Two Weeks Without a Lost Post!

Hey, I know--how about if I do a post about how tired I am?  Because really, I don't think I've mentioned it enough yet. 

Seriously, though, I'm taking myself off the hook for doing a Lost re-cap tonight.  If I manage to stay awake for it (doubtful), I certainly won't be in any condition to write anything coherent.  My brain is not yet working.  I just sat down to Google something, and I typed in "third hair".  I have no idea what that means.  What I was looking for had nothing to do with "third" or "hair".  And yet, there came the words, spilling out of my poor brain.

Have I mentioned I'm tired?

Lost-ishness

Tonight I'm Tivo-ing Lost and taking my sons to see a live production of Fiddler On the Roof.  There may not be many reasons I'd miss my favorite show, but musical theater with my children?  It doesn't get any better than that.

So I'm not going to do my normal weekly recap of the show, because I probably won't be watching it until this weekend.  You are more than welcome to leave your comments about this week's episode, should you be in need of a place to unburden your soul.

Oh, but I do have to point you to this:  a reader told me that the Lost Pieces vignettes at ABC.com are actually really good.  I hadn't watched any of them up to this point--I figured ABC surely wouldn't include anything really revealing.  But OH MY WORD--be sure you watch the one called "So It Begins".  HUGE.