Lost alum Evangeline Lilly was spotted with a visible baby bump in Hawaii on Thursday; the actress’ rep had no comment on the pregnancy. It will be the first child for Lilly, 31, and boyfriend Norman Kali, who worked as a production assistant on the ABC hit.

Congratulations!

[Via US Weekly]

Related posts:

1. Evangeline Lilly Interview With AP
2. On Set Video Interview with Evangeline Lilly
3. Video Interview with Evangeline Lilly

Pre-order LOST: The Complete Sixth and Final Season on Blu-ray & DVD and save up to 40%!

[Via Carlost]

Related posts:

1. Five Deleted Scenes from LOST’s Fourth Season
2. LOST Season 5 Deleted Scenes
3. New Season 4 Deleted Scene: “I Know Chicken”

Her politicians are unknown outside her borders.  Her history is subdued; even the most jarring social movement of the last two hundred years is called the “Quiet” Revolution.  But her culture?

Hockey.  Mounties.  Maple Syrup.  Molson Dry.  We know her culture.

If we know her culture, we must know her citizens.  Constable Benton Fraser, Dudley Do-Right, Sergeant Bruce, and Sam Steele taught us.  Canadians are decent, polite, trustworthy.   When Australian farmer Ray Mullen found a vagabond woman sleeping in his sheep barn he was understandably suspicious.  “You’re an American.”  Not a question, but a statement.  Only Americans could be so disrespectful.  The woman shook her head.  “Canadian,” she said, correcting him.  “I graduated from college and figured I’d see the world.”  Her declaration of Canadian citizenship changed everything.  Now she was a good neighbour, fellow citizen of a Commonwealth country.  She was Canadian.  She was decent, polite, trustworthy.  He believed her immediately.  How could he not?  Annie was a fine young woman from a fine country.  Ray knew he could trust her with his money, with his farm, with his very life.  What could possibly go wrong?

Ethan Rom – from Ontario

Hurley called him “Lance,” until the soft-spoken man corrected him.  “I’m Ethan–Ethan Rom.  From Ontario.”  Hurley’s response was in line with our own thoughts, and in keeping with Ethan’s hope:  “Right on, love Canada, great.”  Who could not love Canada?  Therefore, who could not love Ethan Rom?

Anthony Cooper also said he was from Ontario.  Ben traveled with a Canadian passport identifying him as Dean Moriarty.  When some of the Others asked about Greta and Bonnie, Ben told them they were “on assignment in Canada”.  Charles Widmore gave John Locke a new identity as Jeremy Bentham and new citizenship–in Canada.   Sawyer told the woman he was trying to con that he had a business partner “in Toronto”.  Kate, just before she stole Ray Mullen’s money and nearly killed him, said she was Annie, from Canada.

Canada was referenced ten times in the span of 121 episodes.  Not a single character–even a minor character among the otherwise international dramatis personae–was actually Canadian.  So notorious were Ethan and Kate’s fabricated citizenship that by the time Nathan claimed in “The Other 48 Days” to be from Canada, we were immediately suspicious.  Even in Season Two we knew a claim of Canadian citizenship meant the character was almost certainly lying.  When Ben told everyone that Greta and Bonnie were “on assignment in Canada”, we knew this meant they were anywhere but Canada, and they would be found in a location Ben wished to keep secret.  This turned out to be precisely the case:  Greta and Bonnie were in the semi-secret Looking Glass Station, awaiting Ben’s confidential command.

The deception was effective.  But why?

I blame Sam Steele, and with him, the entire tradition of the NWMP and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Constable Benton Fraser, RCMP

His name is Benton Fraser, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, played by Alberta-born actor Paul Gross.  Fraser was a Mountie very much in the tradition of Sam Steele and a sympathetic but over-the-top caricature of the polite, trustworthy, and self-sacrificing Canadian.  The dog’s name is Diefenbaker, though I don’t know why.  I imagine some residents of Saskatoon may attribute the name to the dog’s faithfulness.  I think maybe the dog got the name because he’s deaf.  But Friday, February 20, 1959 (“Black Friday”) was a long time ago.  If Fraser could forgive and forget, we can, too (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avro_Canada_CF-105_Arrow and also http://www.amazon.ca/Arrow-Dan-Aykroyd/dp/B000065ILG/).

Fraser came into our living rooms every Thursday evening from 1994 to 1998 on CBS in the series Due South.  Stationed at the Canadian Consulate in Chicago, Fraser and sidekick Chicago cop Ray Vecchio solved the most difficult of the Windy City’s crimes.  In four years on U.S. television, Constable Fraser fired a weapon only once–when the Great Lakes freighter he boarded sailed into Canadian waters, meaning his sidearm was (finally!) legal and he could disable the bad guy’s equipment with a perfectly-aimed shot.

Always-polite Constable Fraser is not the only reason for the success of the LOST deception.    If a confidence man has his way with us, it is not because of some independently verifiable fact of life in Canada, but due rather to something internal, something askew in our understanding of the world.  The confidence artist plays to that incorrect understanding, exploits it, and achieves her nefarious ends.

Appearances and Underlying Truth

The mysterious man at Jin and Sun’s wedding should not have been able to speak Korean, but here he was, not only wishing them well in their marriage, but doing it in flawless, perfectly fluent Korean.  Jin and Sun were amazed.  They thought they understood the world and the way it worked.  A man of European ancestry–a man who should have had no understanding of Korean–broke through the bonds of appearance and gave them a glimpse into the underlying truth of his mission.

We need to break through to that underlying truth if we are to understand the con artist’s game.  It is not enough to laugh and say, “I know Constable Fraser is a caricature; Canadians are not always polite.”  True enough.  But as I said above, the problem does not derive of some independently verifiable fact of Canadian culture–it derives of a deficit in our understanding of the world.  It’s internal, not external.

I served in the Peace Corps in Togo, West Africa, for two years.  The culture of West Africa, the way people speak, understand, and carry themselves is very different from what I experienced growing up in the Midwestern United States.  One day toward the end of my service I was in a crowd of people in Lomé.  Everyone was walking with me in the same direction, and I saw only the backs of people’s heads.  One man stood out from the crowd.  He was wearing African clothes, wore his hair close to the scalp as the other black men around him.  He was of average height and build.  I could not see his face.  But something in the way he carried himself, in the way he held his head high, shoulders back, moved arms and legs with purpose–gave me confidence, inner knowledge, that he was not Togolese.  He was American, maybe European.  When he and his friends stopped to purchase some Ghanaian chocolate from a little girl, my curiosity forced me to quicken my stride.  “Cent francs,” the girl informed him.  Twenty-five cents.  I looked at the man.  “It’s the going rate for Ghanaian chocolate,” I told him.  “You live here?” he asked with a heavy British accent.  I tried not to smile.  He was from Charlie’s city, Manchester.   Two years in West Africa had given me the ability to understand mannerisms, even to the point of pulling a black man from the UK out of a sea of black men from Togo.

I knew the man was from England, but did I know anything else?  His motivations?  His ideals?

I visited Munich in the summer of 2006.  It was a time when Americans were becoming less welcome around the world and some travel experts were advocating a bit of deception:  try to make people believe you’re Canadian.  As I returned from my one-week stay I gave up my seat on the subway to a woman just boarding.  The man in the seat in front  of me asked where I was from.  “North America,” I said.  It was not deception–it was the way I was thinking.  But my response could mean only one thing to the German fellow:  I was Canadian.  Americans simply don’t identify themselves as being from “North America”.  He turned to his girlfriend and said something to the effect that he didn’t like Canadians, but liked Americans even less.

What were my motivations for saying “North America”?  I was born and raised in Minnesota, I carry an American passport.  But I speak and write using Canadian rhythms and norms.  I did this for many years before my visit to Germany, and I will be doing it for the remainder of my life.  Can anyone say they understand the rationale for my adoption of Canadian sensibilities?  Does it even matter that I have U.S. citizenship?  Does it matter that I might be able to write my name as Pearson Moore, U.E. (United Empire Loyalist;  my great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, Daniel Smith (Smith #1 in the New Brunswick Provincial Archives), was a resident of Connecticut, fighting for King and Country in 1775 when hostilities broke out.)?  We need to look deeper if we are to understand the Canada deception invented by Damon and Carlton.

I’m Henry Gale, from Minnesota

He said the words with a wondrous combination of conviction and fear:  “I’m Henry Gale, from Minnesota.”  Henry Gale, probably much better known as uncle and legal guardian to Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz.  But we’re not in Kansas anymore, Vincent.  This Henry Gale was from Wayzata, western suburb of Minneapolis.  Wayzata’s only claim to fame, as far as I know, is that it is the city in which Greg Lemond, three-time winner of the Tour de France, decided to raise his family.

If Sayid hadn’t found that Minnesota driver’s licence, the deception might have worked longer than it did.  The discovery of this first of many lies was the beginning of what must have been five dozen or more beatings of the Dharmaville master of manipulation.

Why Minnesota?  The original Henry Gale was doing just fine from his home in Kansas.  Why did Darlton make the conscious decision to change his domicile to a location in the Land of Ten Thousand Lakes?

The state sport in Minnesota is hockey.  The state bird is the loon.  The first Europeans to visit its shores were French fur traders in the 17th century.  If you replace the word “Minnesota” with “Canada” and “state” with “national”, the truth of the first three sentences of this paragraph remains unaffected.  Canada and Minnesota share history, languages, culture, and social institutions.

The ties between Minnesota and Canada are commonly recognised.  Rick Mercer, maybe the best-known comedian in Canada, a few years ago gave his humorous take on the placement of professional hockey teams in southern U.S. cities.  “Now teams from cold places, like Québec, Winnipeg, and Minnesota, are moving to warm places, like Carolina, Tampa Bay, and Nashville.  These are places where hockey is about as popular as bull riding, or women’s bowling.  People who live in the desert don’t like hockey.  They’d rather shoot rats at the dump.”  The video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jcj7dH2rSHA) is hilarious.

Darlton recognised, with Rick Mercer, that Minnesota and the provinces north of its border share more than five-month-long winters.  There are deep cultural connections affecting the way people in these places think, behave, and interact with one another.  Kansas wasn’t going to cut it on the Island of Mittelos.  The Island’s most notorious deception artist would have to hail from a location indicating decency, politeness, and trustworthiness, but it would have to be a location not as blatantly obvious as Ethan Rom’s Ontario.  It had to be Minnesota.  And the way Michael Emerson said it–I could almost smell the air.

Knowledge, Truth, and Understanding

The Smoke Monster knew even the master manipulator could be made to act on incomplete knowledge, that he could plant in Ben’s mind the idea that Jacob was not sympathetic friend but ruthless and uncaring enemy.  Cerberus’ plan worked perfectly, and Ben ended Jacob’s life with very little prodding in their first and only confrontation.

The Canada deceptions share much in common with the MIB’s fabrications about Jacob.  Smokey told Ben the truth, but only those truths that would support his goal of building Ben into the willing and eager assassin of the MIB’s arch enemy.  The last two sentence pose a juxtaposition of thought you may not have anticipated.  After less than a few seconds of reflection the careful reader will take exception with the first statement in this paragraph.  Kate was from Iowa, not from Canada.  John Locke was not “Jeremy Bentham”, and he was from California, not from Vancouver.  So how could the Canada deceptions in LOST be anything other than the most blatant of lies?  How can I say any truth is contained in these deceptions?

If we consider only the obvious aspects of the deception, we will see only the lie.  But every good deception contains solid truth, or the deception would not hold its own weight.

We must endeavour to think about the deception in new terms to grasp the reason for its success.

Is Pearson Moore citizen of the U.S. or is he Canadian?  I submit we need not make a choice.  He is U.S. citizen, but he thinks, moves, and breathes as Canadian.  What is Canada, anyway?  What is the essential stuff of the country where you make your home?  In high school I was told repeatedly that the United States is an idea.  So too, I think, Canada is an idea.  It is an idea much different from ideas I have come to know in my life, and certainly quite different from the idea that claims its birth 234 years ago this day.  The truth of any person’s allegiance is not found in cursory knowledge but in deepest understanding.

Sir Sam Steele, Superintendant, Northwest Mounted Police

What is the truth of any single person’s allegiance?

I wrote at the beginning of this essay that I blamed Sam Steele for the effectiveness of Darlton’s Canada deception.  Unlike the other Mounties I have invoked, however, Sam Steele–Superintendant Sir Samuel Steele–is not a fictional creation.  He was, for fifty years, the flesh-and-blood leader of the Canadian Mounties.  In order to understand why the Canada deception worked, you need to understand Sam Steele, his attitude about police work, and the tradition that flowed from his example.  The most striking truth–possibly outside of the realm of belief, even for Canadians, was this simple fact:  In his fifty years of police work, Sam Steele did not draw his service revolver.  Not once.  I trust historian Pierre Berton (Canada’s most widely-read authority on Canadian history, frequent television personality, and author of roughly three dozen tomes in my personal library) to have researched the facts surrounding this most famous of Mounties.  Steele believed police work was accomplished by force of character.  Modern-day RCMP officers who go about tazering people–literally to death sometimes–could learn deep truths from this man.  He faced greater challenges (e.g., the Klondike gold rush) to peace, order, and good government than any of his successors.

Sir Sam Steele is real.  His life is stranger than fiction, beyond even the over-the-top perfection of Constable Benton Fraser.

We have to move beyond caricatures to truth.  Sam Steele is real, stands for something real, something that has endured even longer than the 143 years and three days that have passed since Sir John A. MacDonald became the first Prime Minister of the Dominion of Canada.  Benjamin Linus and Ethan Rom and “Jeremy Bentham” stood for something, too.  They did not make deception their goal.  It was a means to an end.  Occasionally even Ben would speak the truth.  “Everything I did, I did for the Island,” Ben said into his walkie-talkie.  Ben and Ethan and Locke served something greater than themselves, something real, something that has endured even longer than the 143 years of Richard Alpert’s immortality (that one’s for Nikki).  They served the Island.

Service to King and Country

Even those we considered for many years to be human refuse, the putrid vessels of all that is and can be corrupted, turned out instead to be fighting for the existence of the one thing above all others on this planet that must be protected.   The fought for the idea inscribed on the cork stone, that human civilisation, the work of human hands and joy of human hearts, labouring for the good of all humankind, shall not perish from the earth.  Peace, order, and good Island government.  It’s a new idea, born in the land of hockey, Mounties, Molson Dry, and Bombardier.  But it’s as old as Samuel de Champlain’s handshake with Grand Sagamo Anadabijou in 1603, as old as the hieroglyphs at the time wheel, as old as Jacob and the Man in Black.

The illustration opening this essay has no artistic merit (Dammit, Jim, I’m a scientist, not an artist.  Or was it “bricklayer”?), but it does express the thoughts I had after a particular July First on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.  We heard them before we saw them, the Canadian Forces 431 Air Demonstration Squadron, better known as the Snowbirds, roaring over the Peace Tower and then instantly veering into the signature “Maple Split” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBsl0g7qXck&feature=related).   The never-ending contrails of the precision jets, reaching out toward infinity, signify something unbreakable.  The Maple Leaf Forever, as it were.  It was the best way I could imagine to begin an article on the Canada Deception, an article that would end with the thought that just as all of us carry a bit of the Source’s Light in our hearts, so too, all of us carry a bit of the Maple Leaf in our hearts–even Benjamin Linus and Ethan Rom.  And I knew it would make a fitting and heart-felt tribute to the land I love on the weekend of her birth.

PM
Canada Day Weekend, 2010

Related posts:

1. Humanitas Insulae: The Culture of LOST by Pearson Moore
2. Dying Light: Counter-Culture in LOST 6.15 “Across the Sea” by Pearson Moore
3. Principal Purpose: Culture and Meaning in LOST 6.07 “Dr. Linus” by Pearson Moore

She ran.  She didn’t need a reason.   She ran from the law, from her lover, from her family.  She ran from Sawyer, from Jack, from anyone who sought her heart.  She murdered.  Not once, but many times.  She burned a house to the ground, assaulted federal agents, left her husband, robbed a bank, used a dozen aliases, endangered others’ lives.  She took advantage of a physically handicapped old man, then almost killed him.

Perhaps someone like her does not deserve a second chance.   But the Island gave her a clean slate.  “It doesn’t matter,” Jack told her, “who we were – what we did… before the crash…. Three days ago we all died. We should all be able to start over.”

She learned to love.  Not from the strong men who yearned for her affection, but from a helpless infant who needed her care.  She gave herself, not to a man’s embrace, but to a mother’s rehabilitation.

She is midwife, surgeon, healer, nurse.  She is daughter, mother, friend, and wife.  “I have always been with you,” she told Jack in his darkest hour.

She is devotion.  She is courage.  She is strength.  She is Kate Austen.

The Douglas DC-3

Kate held two dozen hostages and shot three men to retrieve this toy airplane from a bank in Ruidoso, New Mexico.

Ed Mars, the federal marshall who tracked Kate over several years, must have thought this important bit of evidence would be safe in a location so far from Kate’s normal haunts.   Did he know the plane once belonged to her childhood sweetheart, Tom Brennan, who died trying to aid Kate’s escape?

Kate hired three men and engineered and executed an elaborate bank robbery, not to steal money, but to recover the small plastic toy from Safety Deposit Box 815.  The plane had been Tom’s contribution to the “time capsule” they buried in 1989, when they were twelve years old.   Thirteen years later, Tom was a doctor.  He had a wife and a son.  Kate, as usual, was on the run, this time for the murder of her father, Wayne Janssen.  The two of them dug up the New Kids on the Block lunchbox and listened to the cassette tape they made in their youth.

TOM: It’ll be totally cool when we dig it up in like twenty years.
KATE: How do you know we’ll be together?
TOM: Because we’ll be married and you’ll be a mom and we’ll have nine kids.
KATE: I don’t think so. As soon as I get my license we should just get in a car and drive. You know, run away.
TOM: You always want to run away, Katie.

Even at twelve years old they couldn’t agree on their future.  Both of them were correct in their predictions, though.  Tom was happy, married, and well on his way to having the nine children he dreamed of.  Kate by then had much experience with a life centred on getting in a car and driving, to “you know, run away.”

The DC-3 in the stolen lunchbox represented the stable life she could have had with Tom, the commitment he envisioned.  It represented normalcy.

A Normal Life

Wayne Janssen was almost all Kate understood of “normal”, but as she grew into a woman, she knew something was not quite right about her father’s relationship with her mother.  Diane’s face not infrequently bore the signs of struggle:  bruises, scratches, a black eye, a bloodied nose.  She knew Wayne was responsible, and she intended to give her mother the gift of a normal life without her abusive husband.

When Kate brought her mother the happy news, Diane was horrified.  Ed Mars summed up the situation well, with all the sensitivity of his profession.  “White trash mom divorces dad, starts up with some guy who’s a drinker. Then he knocks her around a little bit, she marries him, because, you know, that’s what happens. And then this drunk, this Wayne, he moves into your house, and you get to lay there every night and listen to him doing your mom right there in your daddy’s old bedroom. And even that wouldn’t be so bad if he didn’t beat her up all the time. But she loves him. She defends him.”

Incomprehensible as it was to Kate, Diane loved Wayne, wished to spend her life with him, got pregnant by him.  The result of Diane’s infatuation was the birth of Kate in 1977.  Wayne was the father, but he was not the husband.   Diane was married to an absentee husband, off fighting a war that should have ended twenty years before.

These, then, were the circumstances of Kate’s “normal” childhood.  But they are not the complete circumstances.  Just as Kate’s mother “made her bed” in choosing Wayne, Kate made her own adult decisions about the acceptable range of normal human life.  In the sufferings she endured sharing a house with an abusive father, we might be tempted to feel pitty for Kate.  But she had greater examples than Wayne.  Almost all of us, even those who suffered the most oppressive of childhoods, become acquainted with examples of lives well lived.  In that regard, Kate was more fortunate than many of us.

Sergeant Major Sam Austen

Sam Austen was serving in Korea when Kate was born.  He knew of his wife’s indiscretion, but he never spoke of the matter with his beloved daughter, choosing to allow her to believe that he was her father.  In fact, he was her father in all ways that might have any relevance to a girl growing up in a very bewildering world.  He was Kate’s anchor, the person who most truly and completely loved her, in every sense her Constant.

Sam provided the correct example at every turn.  He taught his daughter to track and hunt game through the forests of Iowa.  He stayed with his wife, despite her infidelity.  When Kate was on the run, she knew the United States Army employed one man of deep integrity to whom she might turn in a time of great need.

Perhaps if he had explained to her the great value of steering a clean course through life she might have been spared the horrendous rollercoaster ride of so many years on the run.  But he was the best father a child could ever hope to have.  His life could have served as perfect template for Kate, but rather than cultivating Sam’s sense of balance for her own life, she chose instead to impose her understanding of a normal order on her mother’s life.  But not everyone can be Sergeant Major Sam Austen.  Kate’s mother made her own choices in life, poorly conceived as they sometimes were.  She never lived up to the good example of her first husband, and she could never summon the discipline to order her life according to his rules.

In murdering Wayne, Kate was failing most egregiously to live by Sam’s example.   She had never chosen to follow his lead.   But Sam would become Kate’s sure example in her own darkest hour, when the fate of the Island, and the world, rested on her decision.

Kate’s World

We need to understand Kate’s range of choices prior to her life on the Island if we hope to make sense of her final disposition at the time of the Island’s greatest crisis.  Kate grew up with four life examples:  Wayne Janssen’s, Tom Brennan’s, her mother’s, and her father’s.

Diane’s example was a life in the gutter.  Take what you can when you can get it.  When life gives you a good man, like Sam Austen, it ends up taking him away for years at a time so he can point his gun toward a demilitarised zone that should have been cleared twenty years ago during their fathers’ war in Korea.   You can’t count on life being fair or even worth living, so take what you can get.

Wayne’s example was to live life for the moment:  eat, drink, and be merry.  If it happens that someone else’s wife is there to be merry with you, so much the better.   While Diane had scruples, Wayne had none.  His was a wild life, lived from one night to another, one bar to another, one woman to another.  Instant enjoyment and survival were the only aspects of life he ever contemplated.

Tom offered Kate an ordinary life, a life committed to each other, a life worth sharing.  This was a life of equals, of two people who truly respected and loved each other.  A mortgage, a car, and nine children.  Though with nine children, it would have to be a very big mortgage, and maybe a couple of large vans rather than a car.  But all in all, an ordinary life of marriage, work, and family.

Sam called Kate to something higher, to a way of life that would not deviate, no matter the obstacle or condition.  Sam did not request from life a woman destined to be unfaithful to him, but this is what he received.   He followed the course he knew to be correct regardless of the poor choices everyone around him made.  He lived a life of integrity, dedicated to ideals for which he was willing to sacrifice even his personal happiness.  One does not extract vengeance, regardless of the crime.  A man takes care of his family, no matter the cost.  His example was the sure sign of the endurance of a set of principles always available to each one of us.  Sam Austen was for Kate, and is for us, an example of our highest humanity.

Kate’s Destiny

Kate chose the wild side, the darker, more exciting angels of her nature.  One man understood her, knew the kind of woman she was, was happy in the knowledge he would catch her.  Kate telephoned him, always on Roman Catholic Holy Days.

MARS: [Picking up the telephone] Agent Mars.
KATE: It’s me.
MARS: Well, I’m glad. I realized this morning that it was the Feast of the Assumption and I was feeling bad. How many holy days have come and gone since you last called? I thought you and I were friends?
KATE: I don’t want to run anymore.
MARS: What’s his name? ….
KATE: Edward, please. I know you don’t want to spend the rest of your life chasing me. Please, I love this guy. Just let me go.
MARS: I’ll tell you what. If you can really stay put? Really settle down? Then I’ll stop chasing you. But you and I both know that’s not gonna happen.

Short days later, Mars’ prediction proved to be on the money.  When Kate missed a menstrual cycle her first thought was pregnancy.  Her second thought was the impossibility of that condition.  Pregnancy meant stability, it meant responsibility.  It meant commitment.  Even if she was married to a man much like Tom Brennan, a responsible, decent man, she couldn’t live like him.

KATE: Whatcha workin’ on?
KEVIN: Just finishing some IRs, and that fugitive recovery in Tampa. Being a cop is just endless paperwork….
KATE: What if I told you I was a fugitive?  What if I told you I was on the run for blowing up my father, and it was only a matter of time before you found out?
KEVIN: This isn’t funny.
KATE: [Crying] It’s not a joke. I almost had a baby, Kevin. Me, a baby! I can’t do this! Taco night?! I don’t do taco night!
KEVIN: Okay, calm down, Monica…
KATE: My name’s not Monica! I love you. But I can’t stay.

If Agent Mars could have heard this conversation he would have been laughing in glee.  He would catch her, because the foul droppings of her misguided life would lead her straight to him, and him to her.  Working on opposite sides of the law, nevertheless they shared an outlook on life, and their view took in only the seamy side, the dark side, the side they both inhabited.

Ed Mars was right.  Kate would fall into any trap he chose to set–it was going to be that easy.  More importantly, Kate’s future was full of sad hours and dark days, and once in the “sideways” world her soul would never know peace, never feel the warm presence of any Constant.

But then Flight 815 crashed.

A Higher Calling

Kate was the midwife.  Always Jack’s second, here she was filling in for the surgeon, who had his hands full trying to “fix” Boone.  Only Locke understood that Boone was the “sacrifice the Island demanded”, but that is a topic for another essay.  For our purposes this weekend, it is enough to say simply that Aaron’s birth was a necessary evolution in Claire’s life, the life of the Island, and most importantly, Kate’s growth from the darkness of Wayne’s world into the light and happiness of life with Jack.  With Boone’s death came the first successful birth since the days of the Dharma Initiative, when Amy Goodspeed delivered the boy she decided to call Ethan.

Life was no less confusing on the Island than it had been growing up in Iowa and living as “Monica” in Florida.  Life was supposed to be a con, a deception, like the life she had started with Officer Callis in Dade County.  Life was drunken Wayne and abused Diane.  Was it any wonder she became attracted to the man who promised her “afternoon delight”?

She was attracted to Sawyer, and to her mind the attraction was normal and probably inevitable.  But she felt something for another man, too.  Jack confessed his love for her, and then he did something entirely beyond Kate’s experience.  Ben was under Jack’s knife in the Hydra surgery.  Guns were pointed at Jack.  When the situation was tense, when lives were on the line, Jack sacrificed his love and risked his own life, not for any hope of being with her, but so that she might escape with her lover, Sawyer.  Jack was subsuming his love to Kate’s desire, foregoing his own happiness so that Kate might be happy.

Here was a love triangle worthy of prime time.  Kate had experienced this depth of love only once, though she didn’t know it, didn’t understand what Sam Austen had sacrificed to love her in precisely the way Jack was now demonstrating his love for Kate.

The Island was  a new world for Kate.

Kate’s Island World

Kate had before her a bewildering array of choices.  Should she follow Sawyer for “afternoon delight”?  Should she try to re-establish romance with that rock of a man, Jack?  The decision was inevitable, even if she didn’t understand the rationale.  In the meantime, there were adventures.  Kate volunteered for more expeditions than anyone else on the Island.  If there was a dangerous trek planned to a newly-discovered Dharma station or 140-year-old shipwreck, Kate was first in line, shoulder pack ready, gun cleaned and chamber full.

Jacob tried to point her in the right direction in Mr. Springer’s General Store, paying for the lunchbox she stole, but Kate was a tough cookie, and hewed close to her chosen life of take-it-and-run-and-to-hell-with-the-consequences.  Jacob must have believed his trip important.  Probably he had prepared years in advance to meet up with his beloved Number 51.  Hers was not one of the Valenzetti Numbers; was she Jacob’s “Variable”, the person who would introduce the new existence coefficient that would upset the inevitable outcome of Valenzetti?  She was important, then, truly essential to the future of the Island, and the world.  But for all Jacob’s planning and hard work, Kate was undeterred from her rollercoaster life.

When they left the Island she knew she would have to make a life with Jack.  He was the kindest, most considerate man she had ever known.  She really, truly loved him.  Learning that he was Aaron’s uncle only confirmed the wisdom of her choice.  When Jack proposed, she felt the deepest emotion that had ever filled her soul, and through her tears she said, “Yes!”

Weeks later their engagement was off, their romance in ruins.  The apparent cause was Jack’s drinking and his jealousy over Kate’s feelings for Sawyer.  But these were not the real causes.  Jack had long known of Kate’s attraction to Sawyer, and had even been willing to let go his own feelings for Kate.  His nature was not possessive and jealous.  The real cause was Jack’s gut-wrenching transition from an existence based on science to a life grounded in faith, and that, too, is a topic worthy of its own essay.  For our purposes this weekend, it is sufficient to note that Kate never gave up on Jack, never felt the slightest decrease in her feelings for this man.  “I have always been with you,” she told him.  She meant those words more than any that had ever passed her lips.

Kate was confused.  The man she loved seemed possessed by the same forces she was now trying to escape.  Her life seemed to be coming together, but now it was falling apart again.  She was acting as mother to Aaron, but even here she felt something was not quite right.

Jacob could not help her find a way to her true destiny.  Jack was stoned on booze and Schedule II opiates, virtually incapable of holding a conversation, let alone dispensing wisdom or providing concrete assistance.  Her mother hated her, wished to see her rot in prison.  Her father couldn’t help her.  But she was not alone.  Help would come from a source she never could have imagined:

The Island.

To Highest Mountain, To Deepest Sea

Claire had to raise Aaron.  It was a ruling somewhere etched in stone, an inviolate law of the universe.   But Claire in her own way was as obstinate as Kate.  No visit from Jacob would have deterred her from giving up Aaron for adoption.  Two visits with the psychic, Richard Malkin, could not dissuade Claire from her decision, and his numerous late-night calls only made her angry.   But the Island had more endurance than Claire.  During her last visit with Malkin, he produced a one-way ticket for Oceanic Flight 815.  It had to be that flight, and it had to be the next day.  Malkin said he had arranged for Claire’s baby to be adopted in Los Angeles.  Of course, he had arranged nothing.  But he knew the Island had arranged something:  a crash that would instantly kill three hundred of her fellow passengers but would miraculously save her life.

She was not among Jacob’s Candidates.  Probably Jacob didn’t even know her, her name, the enormous role she would play in the Island’s endgame.   But the Island knew.  Claire and Aaron were essential, because Kate was essential.  Without Aaron, Kate would never be persuaded to return to the Island after she left as one of the Oceanic Six.  But the Island, in the form of Christian Shephard, ensured her return.

Christian–the resurrected Christian Shephard–came to his daughter and asked to be allowed to care for his grandson.  We don’t know what he told her.  He may have told the truth, or he may have concocted a bold, elaborate deception.  But he knew the outcome.  He would take the infant, put Claire in the hands of the Man in Black and have her escorted far away.  Then, when his daughter was out of sight and too distant to hear even the pleading cries of her own flesh and blood, he would place the infant on the path he knew Kate or Sawyer would walk only short minutes later.

Sawyer, finding the baby, became the temporary and quite flustered guardian.  Kate, deprived of a real mother in her own childhood, could not bear the thought of any child being forced to grow up without a loving mother.  Now, before her very eyes, was the baby she had brought into the world.  Had Claire abandoned him?  Could she not face the responsibilities of motherhood?  Kate knew all about irresponsible mothers.  She wouldn’t allow Aaron to face the kind of childhood she had been forced to endure.

There was no time to decide whether she was acting in haste, no time to locate Claire.  She had to leave the Island, and leave now, or she would never be free.  With the Smoke Monster looming, with the atmosphere of death that permeated everything on the Island, staying behind was not an option.

Three years later, when Aaron was old enough to laugh at jokes and question the authenticity of children’s cartoons, Kate had second thoughts.  She was not Aaron’s mother.  Regardless of her implacable commitment to the toddler, she was no substitute for Claire.  And what of Claire?  If she was alive, she had to be enduring the worst possible torments that any human being can face, knowing only that her son was gone, was nowhere to be found anywhere on the Island.  Was he alive?  Dead?  Suffering?  In the hands of one of the Island’s horrible creatures?  Was he being tortured?  Starved to death?  Kate had inflicted on Claire an existence worse than the most painful and unrelenting death.

Losing Aaron in the grocery story, she realised the horror of her action.  She had felt enormous, almost unbearable pain in the few seconds that Aaron was missing.  Her anguish was relieved in less than a minute.  Claire had been enduring the same torment–not for thirty-six seconds, but for thirty-six months.  Day after day, year after year, incessant, horrible, mind-altering emotional terror.

Kate felt Claire’s pain.  And in that empathy was Kate’s redemption.  In Claire and Aaron she found a cause worthy of lifelong commitment.  Kate would give everything–her own happiness, even her own life–to bring Claire back to Aaron.  Whether she realised it or not, Kate had finally found Sam Austen’s footsteps, and she was firmly planting her own feet in them.  She discovered in herself a reservoir of unconditional love, and now she was harnessing that love to serve a mother and a child.

Kate had to go back.  No mountain was high enough to stand in her way.  No sea was deep enough to keep her away.  Kate would overcome any obstacle to return to the Island, find Claire, and reunite mother and son.

Devotion.  Courage.  Strength.

This is the Kate I know from LOST.  Scarred and wounded but strong.  Unsure but resolute.  Muscular yet feminine.  Fearful yet courageous.  It is a portrait I know most others–even those who consider themselves unwavering fans of LOST–neither appreciate nor understand.  “Ugh, it’s another Kate episode tonight,” many fans said.  Whenever I learned the episode centricity was Kate, I was beaming, looking forward with great anticipation.  Kate and Locke were my favourite characters, and I always had a special place in my heart for Kate’s character and the actress who played her.  Evangeline Lilly bears an uncanny, unearthly resemblance to the protagonist of my first novel (http://pearsonmoore.com/trinity2045.aspx).  Whenever Lilly was called on to carry an action sequence, she owned the scene.  Her talents were terribly under-utilised during the six years, and I feel this was one of LOST’s greatest weaknesses.  She was the female lead, outstanding in action sequences, unequalled in emotional scenes, but the writers chose to use Kate mostly as love object to Sawyer and Jack.  Darlton, you created the most amazing series I’ve ever seen, but by relegating Evangeline Lilly to essentially soap opera roles, you fell short.  Whether she continues as actress or tries to make a go of it as a writer, I have to believe she will continue to astound with her creativity and authentic humanity.

The Island brought her back.  She thought her mission concerned only Claire, finding her, getting her off the Island, and reuniting her with her toddler son.  But this was an almost incidental, secondary mission.  If the Smoke Monster had decided to do away with Claire, Kate’s raison d’être sûr l’isle would still stand.  Her reason for being:  a bullet, administered with sudden and destructive force, into the chest from the dorsal side.  Hers was the highest calling:  to destroy the Smoke Monster.  Claire and Aaron, Claire’s insanity and forced alliance with the Smoke Monster, Claire’s suffering, Kate’s many brushes with death, Christian’s risking of Aaron’s life–all of it was the dangerous, risky, inhumane but entirely necessary preamble to Kate’s role as slayer of the world’s most fearful nemesis.

On the black volcanic cliffs Kate did not run.  She did not run from the Island.  She did not run from the man she loved, did not run from her responsibilities.  She stood firm, aimed the rifle, and delivered the final bullet.

Kate was Jack’s salvation, the Island’s salvation.  She was the salvation of the world, though she must not have known that.  It was almost another day in the jungle for Kate Austen, for she still had work to do.  She did find Claire, brought her home, and must have spent the next fifteen or twenty years ensuring Aaron’s future.

I have heard nothing of the epilogue, save that it concerns Hurley as “Number One” and Ben as “Number Two”.  But we know already that Hurley was hesitant to take on the role.  We also know that Walt was gifted in many of the same ways Locke was.  Add to this the fact that Aaron’s birth was pre-destined, known to the ancients, and a most inevitable evolution presents itself.  Seems to me most likely that the eleven-minute epilogue we’ve been promised on the Season Six DVD will involve one simple storyline:  Hurley will gladly relinquish his role as “Number One” to the young man surely destined to care for the Island:  Walter Lloyd.  And his “Number Two”?  Someday, it will be Aaron.  And if the kid has any brains, he’ll invite Aunt Kate to the Island from time to time.  She could arrive by plane on the Hydra runway.  Plenty of Douglas DC-3s are still in service; Kate would make a most appropriate passenger, visiting in style and comfort the Island whose future she assured.

PM

Related posts:

1. Humanitas Insulae: The Culture of LOST by Pearson Moore
2. So You Could Find One Another: Cultural Perfections in LOST 6.17-6.18 “The End” by Pearson Moore
3. Reconvergence: A Cultural Interpretation of LOST 6.08 “Recon” by Pearson Moore

A single question fascinated us for six years.

One question, posed over six seasons, in each of 121 episodes, in thousands of scenes, the query was always the same.   Thirty-five characters tried to answer the question; twenty-one of them died in the attempt.

The scope was measured not in years but in millennia, not in lives lost but in the hundreds of souls sacrificed.  Time itself had no meaning, for those asking the question and seeking the answer could move about unrestrained by the forward march of the clock.  Each character formed the question into unique words.  For Pierre Chang, the question centred around the origin of exotic matter.  Charles Widmore wondered how the place might be exploited.   The question in its most essential form was simple:

What is this Island?

Paradise

Life is what we make of it.  One couple witnessed the anger and fights and bloodshed and decided none of it made any sense.  Rose and Bernard found a quiet corner of the Island and built a hut.   Occasionally one of the zealots would happen upon their camp, trying to talk sense into these contented people.  The visitor would prattle on about this or that imminent catastrophe.  Rose and Bernard listened patiently, even if the visitor really had nothing to say.

JULIET: Rose, we just need to know which way the Dharma Barracks are from here so we can stop Jack, or you’re gonna be dead. We all will.

BERNARD: So we die. We just care about being together. That’s all that matters in the end.

The wise old couple knew more about the Island than Juliet and all of the Others combined.  Not one of the almost daily fights on the Island required their presence.  No one anywhere suffered injustice because these two gentle souls refused to raise a hand in violence.  And when their time came, they found out they had held the secret of life all along.  What would have happened if everyone else, or even a small handful of them, had adopted the Nadler attitude toward life and the Island?  Could Ben, living in such a blissful state as theirs, ever have plunged a knife into Jacob’s chest?  Would the Island ever have known discord or death?

Rose was never a candidate for any position of authority, and yet the Island cured her of cancer.  Jacob had the power to bestow eternal life.  Could it be that Richard Alpert was not the only resident of this Pacific paradise who had been granted immortality?

Hell

“This place is death.”

Rose and Bernard knew the secret of life, but this was not the only facet of their character that allowed them to enjoy paradise on earth.  Others, not as fortunate, paid with their emotions and their psychological well-being.  Some ended up paying for the Island’s unique powers with their very lives.

The Island had the ability to heal, but it could also induce suffering and death.  Charlotte Lewis was among the unfortunates who could not physically endure the Island.  Hers was not an unusual case.  Only a small percentage of those brought to the Island survived more than a few weeks.  Danielle Rousseau and Claire Littleton outlasted their contemporaries, but gave up their sanity to do so.   Of those who arrived on the freighter, onl y Miles Straum and Frank Lapidus survived.  Everyone from the tail section of Flight 815 ended up dying, with the notable exception of Bernard Nadler.

The Island was a living hell for almost everyone.  By the time Daniel Faraday returned from Ann Arbor with a plan for re-setting all of their lives to a time before the Island, most of them were immediately receptive to the idea.  After the leaders of the Dharma Initiative revealed their true allegiances to power and exploitation, every one of the survivors joined the plan to drop the nuclear bomb on top of the electromagnetic anomaly.

A Game

“Two players.  Two sides.  One is light … one is dark.”

Life is what we make of it.  Some players in the game of life have the power to make decisions about life and death not only for themselves, but for anyone in the vicinity.  Jacob didn’t wait for people to accidentally make their way to the Island.  Sometimes they just needed a little push, and no matter where they were on the globe, Jacob appeared and gave the little push that would send them to the Island.

The Game was more important than life.  Hundreds of people died in the game, but Jacob continued to look into the lives of thousands around the world, seeking individuals he deemed strong enough, with depth of character sufficient to endure the travails of the Game.  He valued human life, but he valued the well-lived life even more.

SAWYER: Tell me something, Jacob. Why do I gotta be punished for your mistake? What made you think you could mess with my life? I was doin’ just fine ’til you dragged my ass to this damn rock.

JACOB: No, you weren’t. None of you were. I didn’t pluck any of you out of a happy existence. You were all flawed. I chose you because you were like me. You were all alone. You were all looking for something that you couldn’t find out there. I chose you because you needed this place as much as it needed you.

Sawyer didn’t protest enough in his only conversation with the backgammon master.  It was his last chance to get answers, but for some reason he chose not to ask.  The important question was finally asked and answered, but this event had to wait until a conversation between the new Protector and his freshly-appointed “Number Two”.  The question is simple:

How is anyone on earth different from the Candidates?

Very few people on earth would ever claim they are not flawed, that they are not “looking for something”.  An unbiased scrutiny of any life would find the person lacking in the way she had decided to respond to the crises and unjust events and ordinary turns of life.  All of us at one time or another–and most of us on a daily basis–make judgments and take actions we consider favourable to ourselves, regardless of the way our personal biases and actions affect those around us.  We hurt others so as to come out ahead.  We are all selfish.  We are all flawed.  We are all “looking for something”.

The Rules of the Game

I believe it is essential to point out that the Man In Black had no name, and he was given no name by design.  At the very least, even if he had  a name, this knowledge was intentionally withheld from us.  A year and a half ago, in audition scripts for the character that eventually came to be called the Man In Black, the character was referred to as Samuel.  We might reasonably ask why such an important character was never given a name.

This is no small matter, and I believe this conscious decision on the part of the writers goes a long way toward understanding the way in which we are meant to look at the series as a whole.

The creators of the series elevated the importance of the character by plucking the show’s first Emmy winner from the role he had given award-winning depth and substance.  I intend no offence to any of the other actors, but polls over the years have shown Terry O’Quinn the favourite actor on the show.  The role of the nameless man was assigned to the series’ most capable actor, but even then the character was never given a name.

I cannot tell you why Benjamin Linus was dispatched to kill the suicidal John Locke in a Los Angeles hotel room.   I cannot tell you why Aaron and Walt were deemed critical to the story, but by the end of the story were almost-forgotten details.  I can make a few guesses here, but the fact is we were not told, and we do have to guess.  I can tell you that some of these unresolved details have contributed to a certain level of dissatisfaction, even disappointment, in the way the series ended.  But I realise now some of that dissatisfaction was intentional.  The writers intended a certain level of dissatisfaction.  They wanted us to seek answers.

Answers

What are the true Rules of the Game?  Many answers apply, most of them are similar or identical, but the only answers that have any enduring value are those provided by faith, or by grace through faith, or by trusting in the Tanakh, or by surrendering to the Creator and His Prophet, Mohammed, may peace and blessings be upon him.  The terminology and rubrics of dialogue and faith vary from one religious tradition to another, but they are all surprisingly similar.

Darlton are not telling us that we must launch into immediate studies of any of the world’s great religions, or that we must experience spiritual epiphany and conversion of the heart in order to understand LOST.  But they have imbedded into the very fabric of the series critical markers that guide us in our understanding.  A hierarchy of values has been created in these six years.  The systemic placement of values gives us a route to questions and responses otherwise obscure.  This hierarchy can be applied to ferret important answers out of critical scenes.  I intend to illuminate some of these markers on the road to understanding.  The questions remain, but our responses do not constitute guesses.  Rather, they constitute the hopes of our heart, the desires of our soul.  Our response is not the stuff of guesswork or theories.  Our answers are the response to John Locke, stretching out his arms and lifting his face to the rain come down from heaven.  Our answers are the response to Jack Shephard, standing ankle-deep in sacred waters, hands clasped in humility, lips chanting words of invocation.  Our answers are the response to faith.

A Place Beyond Science

Perhaps no one among us can speak with authority on a subject as broad as “science”.   The only exception might be “Dr. Science”:

“Ask Dr. Science.  He knows more than you do.”

Dan Coffey of Duck’s Breath Mystery Theatre took the ludicrous notion that any one person could speak on behalf of “science” and turned this impossible conceit into one of the most amusing series on radio.  No one can speak for the diverse set of logic-based disciplines to which we apply the broad term “science”.

I make no claim to be able to speak for other scientists.  However, I am a scientist, and I have been working professionally in laboratories across the North American continent, Canada and the United States, for the past thirty-four years.  My deepest expertise is in a sub-discipline of purification process design, but I have led teams in analytical development, pharmaceutical discovery, late-stage formulation development, early-stage research in various fields, interfacial and surfactant behaviour, and protein purification.  While I may not understand the nuances of much of science, I have been entrusted over the decades with ferreting out various types of natural behaviour that might be exploited for the development of life-saving drugs and low-cost natural supplements beneficial to happiness and health.  Thanks to my efforts and the good efforts of colleagues, the cost of taxol was reduced from over a hundred dollars per gram to less than ten dollars per gram.  You can walk into any supermarket in North America and purchase, at very low cost, a bilberry or blueberry extract that will greatly improve your body’s ability to ward off colds and other ailments.  I hold over a dozen patents on the technology related to berry extraction and purification.  I am no expert on “science”, but I have been a practitioner, and I speak from that perspective.

Science is confined by logic.   If I expand the limits of research to any inquiry that might be included within the scope of logic, science, and mathematics, I must necessarily accept that certain limits nevertheless exist.  Most importantly, I may not ever claim to investigate or to have discovered any facet of reality.  The best I might hope to accomplish, even after a lifetime in the laboratory, is to establish the adherence of certain observed phenomena to models of reality that I create through inference, induction, and deduction.  These models are most often referred to as theories, but they can never explain the real world.  We rely on assumptions that negate any possible connection with reality.

One of the most important assumptions underlying science is Ockham’s Razor (http://www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43832).  In plain language, Ockham’s Razor insists the scientist must accept the simplest solution to a problem as being the correct solution.  If I can imagine a chemical reaction as being the result of the collision of five molecule, but I can equally imagine that the reaction is the result of the collision of just two molecules, and if every observation I have made supports either of the fruits of my imagination, I must accept as valid and correct the imagined event that includes just two molecules.  The reality may be that only one molecule is required, or seven molecules are required, or the event occurs only when there are sunspots on our solar system’s star, but I can never know this.  Even if the model I develop happens to support a theory that is close to reality, I may not ever claim to have elucidated even the slightest aspect of reality.  I am allowed to conclude only that certain behaviours seem reproducible and that they also seem to adhere to a model consistent with Ockham’s Razor and the other underlying  assumptions of the scientific method.

For a more complete discussion of the limitations of science and their application to understanding LOST, please see my article on John Locke (http://www.sl-lost.com/2010/02/14/impartial-risk-cultural-musings-on-the-resurrection-of-john-locke/) under the headings “The Limits of Logic”, “Deception”, “Man of Science”, and “The Nature of Evil”.

Time-traveling Bunnies

PIERRE CHANG: In our first demonstration, we will attempt to shift the test subject 100 milliseconds ahead in four-dimensional space. For the briefest… of moments, the animal will seem to disappear…
LOCKE: Hey. Uh… was he talking about what I think he was talking about?
BEN: If you mean time-travelling bunnies, then yes.
LOCKE: You do know that he said specifically not to put anything metal in here.
[Ben stares at Locke for a second, then gives an exasperated nod and turns back to the task of filling the chamber with metal objects].

Benjamin Linus is no man of science, but he does understand quite well the limitations inherent to science.  He ignores the prohibitions regarding the placement of metallic objects inside the time chamber because he knows the injunction is based on nothing more than a feeble understanding of the nature of the phenomenon the Dharma scientists studied.  Pierre Chang dared approach no closer than his time chamber.  He had seen x-ray images of what lay beneath the Orchid Station.  He knew civilisations from ancient times had manipulated space and time to extents he would never be able to duplicate.

FOREMAN: There’s something in there. And the only way to get to it is to lay charges here and here and blast through it and take a look–
CHANG: Under no circumstances! This station is being built here because of its proximity to what we believe to be an almost limitless energy. And that energy, once we can harness it correctly, it’s going to allow us to manipulate time.

FOREMAN: [Chuckles] Right. Okay, so, what? We’re gonna go back and kill Hitler?
CHANG: Don’t be absurd. There are rules, rules that can’t be broken.
FOREMAN: So what do you want me to do?
CHANG: You’re gonna do nothing. If you drill even 1 centimeter further, you risk releasing that energy. If that were to happen… [Chang looks at the fallen workman and the blood all over his face.] …God help us all.

For twenty years the Dharma Initiative controlled most of the Island.  But never during that time did even the most adventurous among the scientists attempt to unravel the full mystery of the Island’s underworld.  Stuart Radzinsky, using the full force of the science at his disposal, came closest to unlocking the Island’s mysteries, but his experiment failed in a most spectacular manner, illustrating again the limitations of science.

Science is limited in the behaviour it is allowed to posit and explore.  Since logic is a small, man-made, artificial construct, it follows that science is unable to study and develop models for most of the reality we interact with on a daily basis.  Pierre Chang would not go within fifty metres of the Light, could not go within fifty metres of the Light, because not a single observation in the history of science could explain for him the true nature of the Light.  Benjamin Linus could approach the Light, not fearlessly, but with a proper attitude of humility.  He knew of the Light’s power, and he knew that power was not anything that would ever be catalogued or studied or rendered as model by any discipline within science.

Ben Linus knew the experiments at the Orchid Station could only scratch the surface of the Island’s capabilities.  The Dharma Initiative made bunnies travel hundreds of a second through time.  With the ancient wheel far underneath the Orchid, Ben could travel across the globe and across months, years, or even centuries, far exceeding the feeble capabilities of Alvar Hanso’s scientific corps.  But time travel, too, barely scratched the surface of the Island’s capabilities.  Ben knew Jacob’s Number Two, Richard, was ageless, made that way by Jacob, whose powers were in turn granted by the Island.

Most of reality is unknowable to science.  The person most fitted for life on the Island was the one who understood this intuitively.  John Locke was a man of faith, and because of his deep trust in the Island, he understood her better than anyone, better even than Jacob or the Man in Black.

A Cork

The Island knew no greater authority than Jacob, son of a Roman shipwreck survivor named Claudia.  Jacob was given Protector status by the Island’s former Protector, the woman who raised Jacob and his brother.  Jacob knew the Smoke Monster obtained its power from the mixture of water and light in the illuminated cave.  As long as the Light shone in the cave, the Smoke Monster would be unable to leave the Island.  Jacob understood the position of Protector as more than anything the Guardian of the Cork.  He explained this to Richard and to Jack and impressed upon them the absolute necessity of preventing the Monster from ever leaving the Island.  He was, in Temple Master Dogen’s words, “evil incarnate”.  Allowing him free reign in the outside world would lead to more than an exponential increase in suffering.  The consequences were nothing less than the complete destruction of all human life.  This was because the only way for the Monster to leave the Island was by snuffing out the Light.  But the Light was the very stuff of life and death and rebirth; its destruction would lead to the end of life, the end of death, the end of rebirth, the end of all events and conditions making up the cycles of existence.

A Sanctuary

Life is what we make of it.  Jack inherited the Island from Jacob, but he was no disciple of Smokey’s brother.  From his epiphany off-Island to the detonation of Jughead and the sharing of Communion with Jacob to his final breath in this life, Jack Shephard was the unapologetic disciple of John Locke.  For Jack, the Island was not a “cork”, not the Monster’s leash, not an abode of evil.  The Island was, in the words of his master, “a place where miracles happen”.  Jack understood something Jacob never did.  The Island had a multi-dimensional character that went far beyond acting along the narrow constraints of anything that might be understood through logic and science.   There was no logic to the Island, for nothing so joyous could be crammed into the narrow etiologies of human understanding.  There was no science capable of modeling her abilities and powers, for nothing so terrible could be forced into a syllogistic stream.

It was Jack’s more mature understanding of the Island that allowed him to plot and execute the Smoke Monster’s destruction.  Jacob knew the Smoke Monster originated in the terrible power of the Light, but he seemed not to understand, as Jack did, that the Monster was a child fed by the Light.  If the Light went out, the Smoke Monster’s powers would go out with it.  Jack, man of faith, trusted his understanding of the true nature of the Island, trusted in something Jacob never imagined.

The Source of Life and Death

The Light has the power to create and destroy, heal and wound.  It is the source of life and death and rebirth.  Jacob’s adoptive guardian expressed her limited understanding of the Light in these terms because they were the only words suitable, because the full reality of the Light is ineffable.   Here there can be no logic, no science, no words to compare, contrast, or describe.  The Light is at once terrible and glorious, life-giving and deadly.

It is the Source, which means it is not of this world.  That which is the Source of life and death and all things cannot possibly have physical residence in the created world.  We experience the Source as Light, but it is of course entirely beyond our understanding.  It is the only visible sign of the Alpha, the Omega, that which was and is and will be.

The Source is the umbilical, the connection between the natural world and whatever lies beyond the realm of the senses.  It is through the Source that we live and move and have our being.  Each of us carries a bit of the Light inside our hearts, as Jacob’s guardian told us.  When the Light goes out, we lose our identity, our connection to reality, we lose any possibility of life, death, or rebirth.

A Theory of Immortality, Cancer, and Childbirth

The Source is the guarantor of the cycles of life.  The severe cyclic regulation imposed by the close proximity of the Source means that any bodily process–and especially cellular processes–will be subject to more than the normal level of control.  Any cellular process that would normally proceed unchecked is kept in complete balance so close to the Source.  Thus, disease cells, which normally spread quickly, are forced to spread slowly.  Because they multiply slowly, the body’s defence mechanisms are able to kill the disease much more easily on the Island.   So it is that wounds heal quickly in Mittelos, and disease is uncommon.

In general, any type of cellular activity that occurs rapidly is slowed or even arrested on the Island, due to the regulation of life cycles through the Source.  In this special place, women and men may live forever.  In scientific terms, we can understand immortality as an inhibition of the normal processes of aging and apoptosis–cellular death.  Apoptosis, like the spread of disease, is a rapid process of cellular death.  The Source, with its ability to regulate life processes, slows apoptosis and leads to a kind of reinvigorating of the cell.  Thanks to this dampening of cellular processes, people can and do live forever in this place.

Cancer cells multiply much faster than the surrounding tissue.  The Source again forces the cancer to slow and eventually the body kills the foreign cells.  Cancer is virtually unknown on the Island.

When a human egg is fertilised it undergoes rapid mitosis into a zygote and then into the differentiated tissues of a fetus.  Like cancer cells, the cells of the fetus multiply quickly.   The Source seeks to slow this process, but the mother’s body, primed for new life, fights the unnatural dampening effect of the Source.  After several months of fighting the Source–an essentially unopposable force–mother and baby are overwhelmed.  The mother, her hormonal system entirely out of whack, goes into shock, and within minutes, both mother and baby are dead.

Taweret

The earliest inhabitants of Mittelos were grateful to the gods that none of their loved ones ever had to suffer disease or cancer.   Human nature being what it is, though, there were no statues of thanksgiving on the Island.  No days set aside to celebrate another cancer-free year.  One quite prominent statue greeted every visitor to the Island.  This statue was the islanders’ grand attempt at appeasing the very angry goddess of fertility, Taweret.  This ancient Egyptian goddess was so angry, in fact, that every woman who ever became pregnant died several weeks before the baby was due.  The unusual state of the Island that prevented disease and cured cancer was the same state that interfered with pregnancy and eventually caused the death of mother and child.

I must point out that the preceding explanations are all based in science.  The observations of lack of disease, lack of cancer, and death of women during pregnancy are consistent with the hyper-regulation of cellular function by some entity on the Island.  Since we know the Source to be a regulator of life, death, and rebirth, a hypothesis stating that the Source is the entity responsible for all these observed phenomena is entirely valid, and draws support from a wide variety of repeating events on the Island.

I don’t know that this is the type of explanation of Darlton had in mind.  This is a nitty-gritty science-based theory, and in the end, science is going to prove inadequate to the elucidation of most phenomena on the Island.  The fact that the Man in Black was not given a name, the fact that faith was demonstrated to be far superior to logic, and the fact that the Source and the Light and the Island itself were shown to be multi-dimensional entities I believe points us toward an inevitable conclusion:  Some of the remaining mysteries will forever remain veiled to human logic.

I believe this was Darlton’s intention.  If they had wanted us to believe all the mysteries were subject to rational understanding, that A causes B causes C therefore A causes C, they would have shown us the superiority of Dharma science, rather than belittling the hippie-scientists.  If they wanted us to treat this story as a linear unfolding of black and white, good versus evil, they would not have made Jacob a flawed man, and they would have made sure every character addressed the Man in Black as “Samuel”, rather than flagrantly leaving him without appellation of any kind.

I believe many of the remaining mysteries might be unraveled with application of the type of analysis I provided for the death of women in pregnancy.

Four Theories of Life

Life is what we make of it.

During the last 150 minutes of LOST we witnessed four distinct theories of life.  The proponents were the Man in Black, Rose and Bernard Nadler, Desmond Hume, and Jack Shephard.  I’m going to begin the discussion with the Man in Black.

Carpe Diem

Life is tough, and no one has suffered more in this life than the Man in Black.  Even before he lost his body and his soul, he was trying to find ways to rectify the injustices of life.  He knew the Light to be sacred, but he knew his objective–leaving the Island–to be more important than something as simple as a light shining from underground.  When did the Light ever suffer anything?  The Man in Black had to live every day with the knowledge that his people were far away, somewhere across the sea.  [Oh!  Accident pop culture reference!  And I don't even like Bobby Darin!  Taking "La Mer" and turning it into "Somewhere Across the Sea" must be one of the worst musical perversions of the twentieth century]

After he came thundering out of the Cave of Light he knew he was even more tightly tethered to the Island than ever before.  Extreme measures were called for.  Jacob was preventing his escape and guarding the Source.  Anyone aiding and abetting Jacob would be dealt with in a most severe manner.  Those he killed were just ordinary, mortal human beings.  And hadn’t Mother told him people were selfish and untrustworthy?  They come, they fight, they destroy, they corrupt.  It always ends the same.  People are vermin.  The only suitable way to lead one’s life is to take what one can get.  If a few people–or even hundreds of people die so one’s life goals might be attained, well, so be it.  Take what you can get.  Fulfill your dreams, and to hell with everyone else.

Crawl Under a Rock

“We don’t get involved,” Rose said.  It’s a common enough sentiment.  Who among us would not want to settle down in a little cabin by the sea, catch enough fish to live, steal enough Dharma tea to enjoy breakfast.  They have their dog… and their walking stick to protect them.   Entire songs have been written about this way of life.

I’ve built walls,
A fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain.
It’s laughter and it’s loving I disdain.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

….

I have my books
And my poetry to protect me;
I am shielded in my armor,
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb.
I touch no one and no one touches me.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries.

Rose and Bernard are not exactly the hermit of Simon and Garfunkel’s classic song.  They certainly had much greater things to worry about than the pain of broken friendships.  Of course I’m assuming here that neither Paul Simon nor Art Garfunkel was ever ruthlessly hunted through a Pacific island jungle by an unstoppable, unkillable cloud of smoke that travelled faster than an F16 fighter jet, or stalked by a band of evil mercenaries carrying grenades, bazookas, and 300-round-per-minute machine guns.  And as for the final verse of the song, I’m not so sure.  Every time something bad happened on the Island, it rained.  Sure seems to me like the raindrops might constitute tears.

Rose and Bernard made a good choice.  It is not merely a matter of having adopted the philosophy of “live and let live”.  The plane crash threw them into an unhealthy environment.  The people of Mittelos were much more likely to draw guns on each other than engage one another in pleasant conversation.  The Island was reeling and swaying and moving about the ocean and zooming first back in time then forward in time, all of this incomprehensible movement hither and yon accompanied by calamities and catastrophes that literally took six years to catalogue.  Rose and Bernard made a sane choice in the face of their fellow survivors’ uncontrolled, irrational, and patently insane lifestyles.  Given a choice between peaceful days and nights in a hut, and being hunted by Stuart Radzinsky and his henchmen, who among us would choose to be on the receiving end of rifle fire?

Get Ye to a Nunnery

Desmond Hume had a well-defined mission.  Both in Mittelos and off the Island he took upon himself the difficult task of enlightening everyone.  It was a holy task, a mission aimed at bringing people together at a spiritual level.  The ultimate goal was to get everyone into a church–Eloise Hawking’s Church of the Holy Lamp Post (or was it more properly called Our Lady of the Perpetual Pendulum?), but getting them there would be a complicated endeavour.  Desmond would have to choose an appropriate way for all of them to recognise their spiritual connections, their Constants.  He would have to provide enough enlightenment that each one could discern her connection to her Constant in both life and death.

In “The Seven Storey Mountain”, Trappist monk Thomas Merton’s autobiography, he referred to the Abbey of Gethsemane in Kentucky as the centre of the world.  It was monasteries like his that held the world together, he thought.  Desmond was not only helping to hold the world together, he was bringing people together spiritually, helping them see the Light.

Just outside the Cave of Light, Desmond gave Jack the good news.

DESMOND: This doesn’t matter, you know.
JACK: Excuse me?
DESMOND: Him destroying the island, you destroying him. It doesn’t matter. You know, you’re gonna lower me into that light, and I’m gonna go somewhere else. A place where we can be with the ones we love, and not have to ever think about this damn island again. And you know the best part, Jack?
JACK: What?
DESMOND: You’re in this place. You know, we sat next to each other on Oceanic 815. It never crashed. We spoke to each other. You seemed happy. You know, maybe I can find a way to bring you there, too.

For the Common Good

Desmond believed Jack could just leave the Island, forget about what may or may not happen, and settle down to a happy life with Kate.  It was not to be.  Jack had a calling, a responsibility he could not forsake.

“Desmond, I tried that once. There are no shortcuts, no do-overs. What happened, happened. Trust me, I know. All of this matters.”

Jack had to kill the Smoke Monster.  He had to protect the Light.  He knew these things from the certainty of faith and no talk of happiness and being with the ones he loved was going to sway him.  If he left the Island only bad things could result.  If he faced his responsibilities he at least had a chance of making things right again, and preserving the Source for the sake of the entire world.

Living life the Jack Shephard way is difficult, challenging, and at times dangerous.  LOST would have us believe that this is the best life one might choose.  Life is not just about enjoying good times in a hut by the sea, or spending time with those we love in a church pew.  Life is about our responsibility to each other, the human need to work with others toward the Common Good.

Living and Working Together

I loved this scene.  Kate was back where she belonged, a full and equal participant in the struggle to free the Island from the Man in Black.  Jack would never have been able to kill him on his own.  As Christian said, “Nobody does it alone, Jack.  You needed all of them, and they needed you.”

I enjoyed this series more than any other I’ve seen on television.  The story gave us much to consider over the past six years, and I have come nowhere near exhausting the stores of ideas the characters and situations generated.  The series gave us more to ponder than any other television programme I can think of, and created some of the most detailed and complicated and human characters ever to appear on the small or large screen.  Jack Shephard, in particular, was a masterful artistic creation, a kind of hero we can all believe in–have faith in.

My favourites remain Locke and Kate.  Who would have thought Kate Austen would redeem herself by taking a rifle in her arms and putting a bullet in a man’s back?  Both the character and the actress were under-utilised in the series, but when Kate did what she had to do, the series was better for it.  John Locke ended in a way I never would have guessed.  But the other characters, and especially Jack, honoured his memory and revered his wisdom.  In this way John Locke’s story ended in the proper place, not hanging by a cord in a third-rate hotel, but living as mentor and example in the minds of those who protected the Island, and those who saw in Jack the fulfillment of Locke’s faith.

A Place Where Miracles Happen

I imagine a considerable length of time will pass before we see anything on television as compelling as LOST.  Come September 22, the sixth anniversary of the crash, Wednesday evenings are going to be LOST evenings at the Moore household.  Everyone is welcome–except Stuart Radzinsky and Charles Widmore.  Remember, though, it’s BYODB (bring your own Dharma beer).  We’ll supply the wild boar, coconut, and sea urchins.

PM

Related posts:

1. Dying Light: Counter-Culture in LOST 6.15 “Across the Sea” by Pearson Moore
2. Articles of Faith: The Culture of Trust in LOST 6.14 “The Candidate” by Pearson Moore
3. Principal Purpose: Culture and Meaning in LOST 6.07 “Dr. Linus” by Pearson Moore

WARNING: Video contains Spoilers if you have not yet seen this episode!

This episode featured lots of crazy happenings both on and off the island.
Watch the video for the whole rundown and our reactions…

SHARE your theories in the comments section and tell me your thoughts at Twitter.com/AdamRucker

Thanks for watching, and subscribe for our LOST pre-finale special and series wrapup!

Find me @ facebook.com/ruckitup

Related posts:

1. LOST 6.13 “The Last Recruit” Recap/Live Reaction Video
2. LOST 6.09 “Ab Aeterno” Live Reaction/Recap Video
3. LOST 6.08 “Recon” Live Reaction/Recap Video

[Via Bamtan]

Related posts:

1. Mirror, Mirror: Cultural Themes in LOST 6.05 by Pearson Moore
2. Mirror, Mirror (Part II): Cultural Reflections on LOST 6.05 “Lighthouse” by Pearson Moore
3. In Preparation for Season 5, Episode 5: “Lovers” – Votation Results

Who’s next?

[Via FuckYeahLOST]

Related posts:

1. Jack & Kate, Sawyer & Juliet Action Figure Sets Coming in February 2010
2. Season 5 – Sawyer & Juliet Photo
3. What Did Sawyer Tell Kate To Do For Him?

[Via Thewunderblog.com, FuckYeahLOST]

Related posts:

1. Jacob/Man In Black Scene Spoof
2. Michael Emerson on Season 6, Jacob, Ben and More
3. LOST Season 5 DVD Sneak Peek: Jacob

[Via Sky1]

Related posts:

1. The LOST Initiative – “LA X”
2. The LOST Initiative – “He’s Our You”
3. The LOST Initiative – “316″

Spoiler alert: the title of next week’s episode is mentioned on this video.

[Via ABC]

Related posts:

1. The Official LOST Audio & Video Podcast: February 4th, 2010
2. The Official LOST Video Podcast: January 20th, 2010
3. The Official LOST Video Podcast: January 27th, 2010

Official synopsis: Kate finds herself on the run; Jack must do something that may endanger a friend’s life.
Written by: Adam Horowitz & Edward Kitsis
Directed by: Paul A. Edwards.

What did you think of tonight’s episode? Tell us in comments below!

Please, do NOT post any info about upcoming episodes in comments. This includes the preview shown at the end of this episode, episode titles, etc. If you post a spoiler, you’ll be permanently banned. If you see a spoiler, please flag it. Thanks!

Related posts:

1. Episode 5.06 “316″ – Open Thread
2. LOST Episodes 6.01/02 “LA X” – Open Thread
3. Episode 5.13 “Some Like It Hoth” – Open Thread

Magnificence
The Cultural Mythology of LOST 1.01 to 6.18
by Pearson Moore

His name is Kambei Shimada, a ronin who lived five hundred years ago. He is an aged, balding, unemployed swordsman, symbol of a dying breed of men useless in an age of muskets. His story required only two hundred seven minutes of celluloid. We think we know him: hero, defender of peasants, leader of men. But his story does not end with one year’s barley harvest, or even an entire nation’s movement into the modern age. Without Kambei Shimada, we understand neither sixteenth century Japan, nor even twenty-first century America. This single figure from the imagination of Akira Kurosawa holds the key to LOST.

The Adventure of LOST

This six-year adventure has become the most monumental endeavour in the history of television. Millions around the world spend hours each week, not watching a programme so much as engaging our senses, immersing ourselves in an experience unlike anything ever presented on the small screen. We attend online lectures by professors of linguistics, Egyptology, and quantum string theory. The tome in Sawyer’s hand or the thin volume on the Swan Station bookshelf becomes our weekly order from Amazon. We listen to Al Trautwig, Carmel, Mr. James, Iain Lee, and Doc Jensen. Lostpedia is our bible, Vozzek69 our prophet.

We scour every scene for clues. Hurley is buying HO-HOs. Hurley and Jack play horse, but they proceed only as far as HO before Jack decides to leave. Hurley is in the recreation room, and behind him, conspicuous to our fanatical eyes, a plastic sculpture of the letters HO. This is rich fare for a guy who spends sixty hours a week in pharmaceutical laboratories, and I immediately reach for the periodic table in my mind’s eye. Holmium, a heavy metal, a lanthanide, atomic symbol Ho. Can’t say I know much more about it than that–it is obscure, even to a professional chemist. So I turn to the chemist’s best friend–Google. Holmium has the highest magnetic susceptibility of any element, several times more magnetic than iron. The Swan Station has peculiar and extreme magnetic properties. Is Holmium the key to understanding the significance of the Swan Station?

No.

I know this because of my acquaintance with Mr. Friendly. To his complete amazement, I’m sure, I explain to him every nuance of mutually-orthogonal four-dimensional electromagnetic space, and how the unusual concentration of unstable energy at the Swan explains not only the local magnetism, but also the strange light scattering properties of the Island, which are due to shifts away from the normal range of Mie and Fraunhofer diffraction. Five hours later, when I’ve explained every detail of electromagnetism in the Land of Mittelos, Mr. Friendly just shakes his head in amusement. “That’s not what the Island’s about, Pearson.”

What is the Island, then?

I’m going to apply the Mr. Friendly Rule to the remainder of this article. If a concept useful to full understanding of the core reality of the Island requires graduate-level expertise in a physical science, then the concept is not essential to that understanding. Studying the non-intuitive etiologies deriving of Schrödinger’s Cat and other quantum phenomena is entertaining, but at least for the purposes of my discussion, I’m going to bring the question to Tom Friendly and Flight Attendant Cindy Chandler (now Temple dweller Cindy, I guess). If they can’t figure out what I’m talking about, it probably is not relevant to the deeper aspects of the story. The Island is not a Mr. Wizard science freak show.

What is the Island?

The question is daunting. We are aware of two hundred forty-seven questions outstanding, thousands of details that must be woven together over the course of so many years to figure out just what Jacob’s Eye of Horus might signify, why it contains important Egyptian and Greek elements, and why nine individuals are depicted as bowing in obedience to the Eye. Jacob’s tapestry, laboriously spun from wool and woven on a hand loom, is symbolic of the tremendous investment in time we have given to reconciling unusual phenomena, extreme and unpredicted events, and most of all, the strange circularity and interconnectedness of Island, people, and time.

Much more than science is required to understand the Island. We gain important clues to the deeper appreciation of Mittelos’ significance from the narrative structure of the story itself.

Normal storytelling does not work on the Island, because LOST cannot unfold in linear fashion. The chronologies of cause and effect were difficult to track long before the time travel of Season Five, before Daniel Faraday demonstrated the bizarre curvature of spacetime around the Island in Season Four, before even we heard Mama Cass exhorting Desmond Hume to make his own kind of music in Season Two.

Why is the story nonlinear?

(Connections Web, Lost, Season 2. About 8% of the web is depicted here.)

A woman’s body is found unmoving in a pool of blood in a basement apartment. Neighbour calls the police, detectives come, interview tenants, landlord, husband. They search telephone calls, internet usage, medical records. Police identify suspects, assign motives, make an arrest, and there’s a trial. Bad guy goes to jail, and the world is safe again. Best thing is, it took only forty-three minutes (not counting seventeen minutes of commercial messages) to tell the whole story from start to finish.

Law-And-Order storytelling could not possibly work on Jacob’s Island. I suppose one might imagine LOST as a simple story of good versus evil, much in the manner of CSI, Law and Order SUV (Or is it CSI-SVU?) or any of the other programmes that seem to fill prime time in North America. But LOST brings much more to our dialogue: Free will versus Destiny, Destiny versus Fate, the philosophical imposition of Rousseau, Locke, Dogen, Burke, Bentham, and the religious sensibilities and histories of Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Even Greek mythology and ancient Egyptian religion are heavily represented. Now that we’re finally inside the Temple, it looks like we might soon be absorbing a dose of Shintoism as well.

As Lex Luthor said thirty-two years ago, “Some people can read War and Peace and come away thinking it was a simple adventure story. Others can read the ingredients on a chewing gum wrapper and unlock the secrets of the universe.” LOST is not a simple adventure story. If we apply and focus the full range of analytical tools on the story we will unlock ideas of great value.

The Island operates on a hierarchy of values. Any valid thesis regarding LOST must account for the vital and mortal truths of Mittelos. Theses addressing only scientific phenomena, character relationships, or pure mythology will fall short of identifying the most potent and enduring of LOST’s ideas.

LOST must be presented in a nonlinear, non-chronological, non-causal manner because of the complexity of the hierarchy. Most of the time Cerberus can mind his own business, curl up under the Temple and contemplate getting off the rock he has been stranded on. Sometimes he gets ornery; knowing when the MIB is in a bad mood–and where he is at the time–constitutes useful information to anyone interested in prolonging her stay on the Island. Sometimes the rules of the Island dictate that he will kill. Being aware of the conditions that oblige Smokey to execute the full force of Island law is a matter of life and death.

LOST Mythology

The mythology of LOST is insufficient to a satisfying appreciation of the Island’s deepest meaning. The creations of the Island that appear to be unique–The Smoke Monster, Jacob, Ricardus, the Temple Master–are not self-referential. They are not unique creations at all. This statement subtracts nothing from the unparalleled creativity of the series. Fifty years from now LOST will be considered no less a masterpiece of storytelling ingenuity than the story of Kambei Shimada’s defence of a poor village during the barley harvest.

The Man in Black can transform into a cloud of black smoke. Nothing new. Over a hundred years ago H.G. Wells created The Invisible Man. Men turning into wolves and other animals have been standard fare on movie screens for eighty years. The MIB acts according to law, a judge of thought and action, a guardian of the world under the Temple. Nothing new. The Dharma Initiative knew the MIB as Cerberus, from the Greek myth of the guardian of the gate between Hades and Earth. I would guess at some point in the near future we will come to understand the MIB as something closer in character to an angel. Again, nothing new. I imagine if Damon and Carlton read this, they will not feel slighted in any way by these words. I think they’ll be smiling, actually.

The goal of LOST is not creativity for the sake of innovation. LOST is the most creative programme ever produced for television, but this is not its unique or most important objective. Neither is it intended as Lex Luthor’s adventure-story interpretation of War and Peace. The intention is to create an idea of permanent value. The next seven hundred minutes–the remaining sixteen episodes–are crucial, for the story will have to resolve many plot threads and concepts for the creators’ grand ideas to establish enduring purchase in the literary world.

The genius of LOST is its profound connection to our awareness as human beings, to the deepest sensibilities of our nature. A story becomes literature, I think, when it engages the reader, plunges her into the story, and forces her to examine and perhaps even reconsider her own values in light of choices made by the characters in the difficult situations created by the author. Literature best achieves these ends when it weaves into the story elements of thought immediately recognisable to the reader.

Kambei Shimada did not act alone to save the farmers from marauding thieves and bandits. And Akira Kurosawa did not restrict himself to self-referential creations. The master storyteller reached back to over a thousand years of Japanese history to invoke themes and ideas that have stood these many years, proof to wars, plagues, and all manner of human imperfection. He examined poverty, nobility and altruism, gratitude–and the lack of it, and the injustice of a class-based society, among the grand themes of the film.

Kurosawa gave us memorable characters, most notably in Shimada, the balding leader past his prime who, on first attempt, failed to convince other ronin to follow him to the village. But more than memorable characters and situations, the director wove his story from the strong yarn of enduring culture. His film stands not only as an irreplaceable pillar of modern Japanese culture, but is considered by many the greatest film ever produced.

Few in North America have experienced the genius of The Seven Samurai, but the most frequently offered movie on American television is familiar to almost everyone on the continent: The Magnificent Seven.

Set in 1880s Mexico, seven unemployed gunslingers agree to risk their lives for twenty dollars to protect a village of farmers.  The lead role of Chris Adams, an aging bald man past his prime, was played by Yul Brynner.  John Sturges’ characters were as memorable as Kurosawa’s, most notably in Chris Adams, who, on first attempt, failed to convince gunslingers to follow him to the village.

The story of the Seven Samurai works perfectly well in any culture because the enduring and necessary elements of any culture transcend time and place.  One of the notions that works equally well in sixteenth century Japan, nineteenth century Mexico, or the twenty-first century South Pacific, is the idea of perfection.  In both the Kurosawa classic and the American remake, perfection is expressed in a number:  Seven.  In Japanese, Hebrew, and Western cultures, the number seven is perfect.  The perfect number of selfless men to protect a village? Seven.  The perfect number of selfless individuals to protect an Island?

The very stressed characters on Jacob’s Island are striving toward some better condition.  They strive toward perfection.  As Jacob said, “It only ends once.  Anything that happens before that–it’s just progress.”

The six numbers, the Oceanic Six, all their striving to date has had little effect because it has lacked coherent and collaborative movement toward perfection.  The single biggest loop-changing event, the action that temporarily displaced two instances of spacetime, was initiated not by one of the Six, but by the son of the former leader of Jacob’s people.

Six are not enough.

All of Jacob’s plans, all the Temple Master’s plans, and the hope of the Six must converge on the absolute need to deliver one very important seventh member of the posse safely to the Island.  At least two will die on the journey.  But their work will not have been in vain.  Because the person they need to deliver is the one person in the world Cerberus cannot touch.  In fact, this person will stare down the Smoke Monster–and win.  He will stare down Jacob–and win.  And one person, supported by the Six, will rule the restored Island–the place once called Eden.

The perfect number of selfless people to protect a Japanese village?  Seven.
The perfect number of selfless people to protect a Mexican village?  Seven.

The perfect number of selfless crash survivors to protect an Island?

There will be Seven.

Culture

Those of us with degrees in language or literature share an interesting hubris:  We believe we enjoy not only innate curiosity regarding the nature of the human condition, but also an obligation, essentially a moral imperative, to find the means to engage others in a contemplation of the meaning of existence.

Usually the artist is thwarted in her attempts to engage the audience.  She must feed herself, after all, and employers are not interested in art for art’s sake, they’re interested in selling a product or service.  Radically new ideas, risky by definition, are not generally seen as worthy of investment.  So the artist becomes a waitress, or sells commodities at the Chicago Board of Trade, or works sixty hours a week in a pharmaceutical laboratory… and the sculpture goes unseen, the screenplay unread, the great symphony unheard.

Sometimes the artist gets lucky.  A small work gains attention, a former employer earns a profit on the artist’s work, a second employer, willing to take a risk, agrees to feed the starving artist while she whips up another small creation.  That was the intention with LOST, as far as I can tell.  But something unexpected occurred:  18.6 million viewers.

What does an artist do when she’s given a nice salary and carte blanche?  Room 23 in Los Angeles is full of cartes blanches, and for nearly six years the writers have been filling them with scenarios, plot developments, character arcs, storylines, and most of all, cultural references.

The writers know the best way to engage the audience is to weave LOST into the very fabric of our lives.  They can do this only if the basic material is already there.  The greatest demonstrable skill of the artist is not the creation of new ideas.  Ideas are a dime a dozen.  The greatest skill is the ability to engage an audience.  If, in order to achieve this end, the artist must use fabric already present in the viewer’s psyche, she must endeavour to choose the strongest, most enduring yarns from that fabric, then re-weave them into something new.  The bottom line for us:  Regardless of any story innovations, LOST must rely on cultural motifs we all recognise.  The necessary connections between culture and the completed plotline provide a basis for a reasonable understanding of the outcome of the story.

The Island

The Island is Shangri-La and LOST is James Hilton’s Lost Horizon, updated to the internet age and stuffed with a hundred-fold more cultural references than Hilton ever thought to include in his masterwork.  The Darlton Shangri-La surpasses Hilton’s creation in ways critical to the telling of the story.  Most importantly, Mittelos is a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic Shangri-La with origins in Tibet, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Hawaii, and Japan, deep religious roots in Judaism and Christianity, and mythic roots in Ancient Greece and Ancient Egypt.  Those in the Western world will recognise elements of Eden:  Adam and Eve, harmony with nature, timelessness (e.g., Ricardus’ immortality), inaccessibility (a trait shared also with Lost Horizon), guardian angels (MIB and Jacob).  Mittelos references myths from around the world because this is a story for the entire world–for all of humanity.

The Island is a stern kind of paradise.  Mittelos has unbreakable rules.  Anyone making a decision to break these rules faces judgment of the Dark Angel–the MIB.  The MIB’s decision is immediate and final.

What The Island Is Not

The Island most emphatically is not Cheech and Chong’s pot-smoking, hippie-infested free-love paradise.  Lennon may wear love beads around his neck, but he feels no emotion of any kind when he relays the command to exterminate prisoners.  Lennon is only the most recent representative of the hippie counter-culture.  Darlton have made clear to us their unreserved disdain for any organisation on the island expressing hedonistic ideals.  Hedonism in LOST is a ploy, a diversion used to mask the true agenda of those in command, and that agenda is the acquisition of power over others.  Culture, on Darlton’s Island, seeks the Common Good.  Counter-culture seeks to concentrate power into a single dictator and her minions.  Counter-culture is what it implies:  a radical opposition to culture.  It is the purest expression of evil because it rejects everything of humanity that endures and is worthy of being held as ideal and exemplar of thought and behaviour.

Stuart Radzinsky, the first Man in Black, is the archtype for the Dharma hippie, and Darlton’s sternest warning to those who would abandon our common humanity in favour of power, wealth, or any of the other counter-cultural idolatries of self and selfishness.

Radzinsky doesn’t give a hoot about anyone else’s projects, ideas, or needs.  He believes his motivation to be scientific exploration, but his supreme selfishness has made him not only oblivious to others, but willing to fulfill his smallest desire at gunpoint.  If Dr. Chang had stood in Radzinsky’s way at the Swan even one more minute, Radzinsky, not the unrestrained power of infinity electromagnetic energy, would have chopped off Chang’s hand.

In Russian culture, the supreme insult, worse than anything that one might say about another human being, is formed with these words:  Он некультурный человек.  He is uncultured.  Radzinsky is uncultured.  He is an insult to the Russian people.  He is humanity’s disgrace.

Widmore

The off-Island Radzinsky is, of course, Charles Widmore.  Charles has turned his insider knowledge of past, present, and future into a multi-billion-dollar international conglomerate in league with nefarious uncultured thugs like Mr. Paik and the bloodlust mercenary, Martin Keamy.  The writers may try to rehabilitate Widmore in the next few episodes, but I tend to doubt it.  Power and wealth are counter-culture objectives, and Widmore is the greatest off-Island example of their successful acquisition.  He fathered a child off-Island.  His banishment may have been the only possible outcome of  breaking an unbreakable rule, or the one-way submarine trip may have resulted from nothing more than Benjamin Linus’ own lust for power.  But his activities since that day in shackles place him in Radzinsky’s ideological camp.

If Widmore is to be rehabilitated we will see him devote his massive wealth to the support of the Seven.  More likely, I feel, he will bring not only his wealth but his very presence to the Island, and the final war will be his naked, all-out attempt to seize control of Mittelos.  Charles Widmore is the top dog, the main antagonist of LOST, not the equal of Benjamin Linus, but the final obstacle to the leader of the Seven.

Cerberus

The Man in Black is not evil.  He has an assigned task, and he is fulfilling his destiny.  The Smoke Monster is, in Dharma terminology, the Island’s “security system.”  He is among those unearthly creatures–angels–who have been assigned the grim but necessary tasks associated with the care and grooming of Planet Earth.  It was he or his cohorts who were entrusted with the visiting of ten plagues on Egypt.  He, over the millennia, who has caused armies to win over impossible odds or die in battle when victory seemed assured.  It was he who was tasked with keeping people away from Eden.  His contempt for Jacob’s breaking of rules was most manifest in their discussion on the beach at the end of Season Five.  Cherubim with flaming swords are supposed to prevent anyone from ever again entering Eden.  The MIB is a cherub, and he wishes to have none of Jacob’s lawlessness.  Although the original job description says nothing about killing a fellow angel, Jacob is thwarting the Dark Cherub’s divinely-appointed task.  Cerberus has reasonably interpreted this to mean he is free to eliminate the entity thwarting the Divine Plan.  Though he doesn’t like his job, he must obey:  The Man in Black had to kill Jacob.

Jacob

Jacob is He Who Wrestles With The Deity.  He is of his own mind about the value of humanity, and his worldview is broad but incomplete.  He sees humanity as an infinite, multi-dimensional divine experiment having as its goal the attainment of perfection.  The best way to attain perfection, in his mind, is to allow the broadest possible movement of actors and agents over the field of play.  He is a Light Angel, and his mandate is to lift humanity to perfection.  He neither understands nor has any patience for the Dark Angel’s insistence that people be kept off the Island.  No one told Jacob he had to clear his plans with another Cherub.  He has his divine mandate and the instructions are quite clear.

Jacob doesn’t understand any requirement for rules.  While the MIB’s rule book is literally etched in stone, Jacob’s rule book is, well… flexible.  Or so he believes.  If he feels he can interpret the divine mandate in such a way that offering someone a free choice among possible destinies will further the task of achieving perfection, he will emphasise personal volition.  If he feels he needs to coerce to achieve his objective, he’ll do that, too.  Jacob is a free-flowing agent of improvement and advancement.

Jacob is not dead.  He understood the MIB’s plans, but he also understood the potential for Faraday’s Boulder, and the fact that a splitting of spacetime would allow him to achieve his objective in a condensed time frame.  Jacob is either off-Island, or he is on the Island but in some other form:  inhabiting the rusty pool in the Temple, inhabiting a dead body.  Perhaps to be seen as a pillar of white smoke or Locke’s brilliant white light?

The Numbers

The numbers provide the clearest insight into coming events on the Island.

I don’t know what the seventh coefficient will be.  In fact, I don’t know that the writers will even decide that the six existing coefficients will need updating, or that 108 will have to be revamped to some higher number.  But a seventh person, and a seventh number, must appear.  I have to admit to the strange desire of hearing an invocation of the Valenzetti Equation in its correct form, with all seven coefficients:  six variable coefficients and one constant.  The equation that determines the inevitability of human self-destruction rendered inert by the unopposable will of one human being.  I’m going to guess that a single click in the integer position will accomplish the task, and the seventh person will be assigned the number One, for a new seven-coefficient sequence:

1, 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42

Regardless of the specifics, a seventh key player will somehow appear on the Island.  The seeking after perfection implicit in Jacob’s statement will find expression at several levels in the story, beginning with the establishment of a Perfect Number (seven) as the unstated goal of those on the Island.

Aaron

A corollary implication:  The full Oceanic Six must be present on the Island before the Seven can complete their work.  Aaron, or some duly anointed proxy, is going to return.  I’m seeing in my mind’s eye a desperate Carole Littleton, in league with Kate Austen, coercing Claire into an emergency flight on Oceanic or Ajira (no time to create a third airline for Season Six, I’m guessing) with unborn or infant or fully grown Aaron in tow.  By the time of the flight the Island vortex will be growing more and more unstable (see my discussion of Faraday’s Boulder in last week’s analysis, “The Wounds That Heal Us:  A Cultural Analysis of Lost 6.01/6.02″), and the Island will either be raised from the ocean floor or the airliner will fly through the vortex into main-channel spacetime to the unsunk Island.

The Disciple

Jack Shephard is first disciple to the leader of the Seven.  He was the Man of Science, and now the Doubting Thomas, who will sacrifice anything other than his own humanity to see the leader installed as ruler of the Island.  Jack’s road has been troubled because he has spent most of his life pushing toward reconciliation with his father rather than fulfilling his own destiny.  He will experience redemption, which is not harmony with Christian, but realisation of his place in life, which is acolyte to the Seven.  His is unquestionably the most important task in this sweep of six years, and because his task is greatest, he will have to sacrifice the most.  Jack Shephard, in safely conveying the leader back to the Island, or in ensuring the leader’s success, will sacrifice his own life.

The Advisor

Kate Austen loves Jack Shephard in a way that few have ever come to love another human being.  She will do anything for him.  She is willing to give up all of her plans to support Jack in his great work, and in fact, she will, in the end, being willing to sacrifice herself rather than see Jack thwarted.  The love triangle could find resolution in precisely this way, I believe, and the keepers of the symbols of Light and Dark–Adam and Even–could turn out in the end to be the two great sacrificial heroes of Mittelos:  Jack Shephard and his true love, Kate Austen.

The real triangle of LOST is not anything the Skaters and Jaters have contemplated to this point.  The competition for Kate’s heart is not between Jack and Sawyer.  The triangle is established by Kate, Jack, and the leader of the Seven.  Kate will have to decide whether she wishes to have Jack for herself, or whether she can sacrifice her love to the greater goal of realising the Island’s destiny.  In the end, she is going to be the Advisor who gives Jack that final push, encouraging him to surrender his own life for the good of the Seven and the Island.  This scene, this gloriously emotional and profound scene, will be remembered as possibly the defining image from LOST.

There is cinematic precedent for Kate’s Choice.

Rick and Ilsa loved each other in ways no less profound than Kate’s love for Jack.  But as deep as their love was, the needs of humanity were far more profound.  In the end, Rick made the only humane decision, the only cultured decision:  He gave up his love for the good of Victor Laszlo, the Resistance, and the freedom of all mankind.

Rick’s Choice now becomes Kate’s Choice.  The stakes are even higher this time around.  Rick and Ilsa faced the prospect of an eternally enslaved Europe.  Kate and Jack are at the crossroads of two equally evil future worlds:  A world without rules (Jacob’s vision) or a world without compassion (Cerberus’ unyielding stone tablets).  The future of humanity rests in the fragile heart of one woman.  The final scene at Casablanca Airport was magnificent.  Magnificence will shine even brighter when Kate makes her final choice.

I am not sure of Kate’s final destiny.  I think chances are good she will die in giving Jack the final push, and she will be revered as Eve.  I think this would be the most satisfying conclusion to her position as primary heroine.  But Sawyer’s arc may require a prize.  As much as he reads, he is no Churchill, and I don’t see his character requiring a sacrifice.  But reality is split, Juliet lives, and Sawyer and Juliet love each other.  The quadrangle is satisfied with the heroic deaths of Jack and Kate and the reunification of Sawyer and Juliet.  This is most obvious from an examination of the rubrics of storytelling.  Juliet is not the primary protagonist, so she does not have to experience complete sacrifice.  Kate, higher in the storytelling hierarchy, must sacrifice more.  Giving up Jack may suffice in the writers’ minds, but I think if they push this story to its natural perfection, Kate will have to die.  I see the Skaters’ wet dream ending of LOST as a minor but entirely supportable possibility.

The Heretic

Ben, chosen decades ago by Jacob, fell from grace when he decided to pursue his own agenda rather than working for the good of the Island.  He will come back into Jacob’s fold, leading Hurley and a handful of others, recharged, reinvigourated, with greater zeal than he has ever shown.  But for all his ardour, he will realise almost too late that he is still fighting on the wrong side.  A last-minute conversion to discipleship under the true leader will save him from destruction and raise him to hero status.

This seems the most logical outcome to Ben’s story.  He is the most conflicted, ambiguous character in the LOST universe, and I believe the writers will use him as the final example of the redemptive power of human culture.  A distant possibility, I think, is Ben’s defence of Jacob to the bitter end, and martyrdom to Jacob’s incomplete vision of humanity.  Even more distant, I feel, is the possibility of Ben’s continued rejection of Jacob and an inability to subsume himself to the needs of the Seven.  But because of this character’s complexity, I think it quite possible the writers could weave new aspects of Ben’s character that could yet cause him to fall in line with Widmore, or even take Widmore’s place as antagonist.  But I see these as unlikely scenarios.

The Seven

As of Episode 6.01, Sayid has experienced either rebirth or bodily possession by some other entity.  He yearns for a life free of torture, murder, and death, and probably feels no love for the gun-toting hippies and martial arts practitioners in the Temple.  Is he going to find the MIB’s team any more appealing?  I think the most likely outcome of Sayid’s rebirth or bodily possession is his quick ability to see the folly of both Jacob’s ways and the lack of compassion in Cerberus, and he will be the first of the Six to advocate and plan for the return of the leader.  Sayid is the catalyst of the leader’s return.  His would be the most logical death if the writers decide to give Kate as prize to Sawyer.  Otherwise, Sayid will go on to enjoy torture-free life on the new Island under its compassionate and rule-abiding leader.  Sayid and Hurley, I think, are the two of the original Six most likely to “live happily ever after.”

Sun will find her Jin.  Her aversion to Ben will blind her, and despite Ben’s efforts to convert her to what he believes to be the  just cause of returning Jacob to power, she will succumb to Widmore’s entreaties, at least temporarily.  She is the most likely of the Six to help Widmore or his agents find or gain access to the Island.  But both she and Jin were touched by Jacob, and in the end she and Jin will come back, not as followers of Jacob, but as disciples of the true leader.

Hurley will find himself in the unlikely and uncomfortable position of fighting side-by-side with Benjamin Linus in the interest of bringing Jacob back to the Island.   His will be another almost last-minute conversion, when he realises there can be no paradise under Jacob.  He will join the true leader’s camp, probably in an all-out sprint, huffing and puffing, clearing the barrier just before a door or portal or spacetime displacement closes forever.

The Leader

His name depends on the story.  In The Seven Samurai, his name was Kambei Shimada.  In The Magnificent Seven, his name was Chris Adams.  On the Island… he has had many names on the Island, too.

The actor portraying him needs to have solid credentials, because the masterful execution of the role is critical to the success of the multi-million-dollar storytelling enterprise.  Takashi Shimura had over twenty years of acting experience before Akira Kurosawa offered him the role of Kambei Shimada.  Yul Brynner had been acting for over twenty-five years when John Sturges chose him for the role of Chris Adams.

The themes are similar from one story to another.  One man, wise beyond even his advanced years, enlists a group of six to fight an enemy much more powerful than their individual combined strengths would indicate, not for any benefit to them, but for the benefit of others.  The six at first are hesitant; some refuse the first offer to work for nothing with the risk of giving up their lives.  But when they become the Seven, they are unstoppable, because they have achieved perfection, and perfection means they fight for the Common Good, not for themselves.  They fight to establish and uphold our common humanity, which is our culture.  It is the only correct side of any fight, and the full force of human goodness is on their side.

In the sixteenth-century Japanese village three of the Seven died.  In the nineteenth-century Mexican village three of the Seven gave up their lives.  On the twenty-first century island, three of the Seven are likely to die.

Like Kambei Shimada and Chris Adams, he is bald.

His name is

Man of Faith
Sodding Old Man
Geek
Prince of the Island
The Colonel

He goes by many names, but his final name is Leader of the Seven.  Most of us know him as John Locke.

Locke.  Man of faith.  He stands ready to put his trust in anyone.  But those around him are not so pure, and his easy faith in others has been twisted time and again into gullibility.  Duped, deceived, taken advantage of, made into buffoon and worse, he has suffered the cruelty of others, but has never made others suffer.  He has never unleashed righteous anger on anyone other than himself.  Locke is pure of heart, pure in his defence of the Island.  The Dark Angel cannot touch him, because judgment can be meted out only against those who transgress the laws of the Island.  Locke has broken no laws.  He will become the final defender of law, freedom, and human culture on the Island.

Unbridled free will leads to hedonism.  Culture is the only valid human origin of personal autonomy.  Most of us, like Radzinsky and Widmore, never learn the lessons of youth.  Freedom begins with responsibility, not with the momentary impulses of personal desire.  This is a concept foreign to Radzinsky and Widmore, foreign to almost everyone trying to make sense of life on the Island.

Law without compassion leads to the dark judgment of Cerberus.  Those of us who do not become slaves to momentary desires surrender ourselves to arbitrary law.  But even those who believe themselves “law-abiding citizens” break laws we consider to have no moral hold on our lives.

Locke obeys the law, but he is compassionate, too.  He is Dark Angel, Light Angel, and reservoir of human culture:  The complete human being.

Claire’s dream in Season One contains the essential clue to the end of the story.  Locke will faithfully execute both the MIB’s mandate and Jacob’s mission, providing his faith and trust in eventual human goodness as the solid foundation for fair and compassionate judgment and the complete freedom of action that will allow humanity to proceed on the road to perfection.

LA X.  The Locke-Aaron Crossroads.  Locke and Claire’s child are the two remaining essential players not yet on the Island.  But with the flight of 815 through the vortex over the sunken Island, the crossing of Locke and Aaron from the sunken-island spacetime over to the unsunken spacetime is now a possibility.  Sayid will realise the first glimmer of this possibility, and he will try to rally everyone to the cause.  He may achieve just enough for Kate to take charge, but she will not be able, on her own, to bring Locke back to the Island.  That role was pre-destined to fall to Jack.  His love for Kate will prevent him from committing himself immediately to the duty.  But Kate will convince him, and he will make the final sacrifice.  Kate will most likely die, too.  At least one other among the Seven will die, most likely Sun, but possibly Sayid.   Of the Seven, Hurley is least likely to die.

The Final Chapter

Shangri-La will be restored.  Adam and Eve, the two who allowed a return to Eden, will be revered for their heroic sacrifice.  Most likely we will find out the skeletal guardians of Light and Dark are the remains of Jack and Kate.  Less likely possibilities include Sawyer and Juliet, Rose and Bernard, Sawyer and Kate, or Sun and Jin.

Jacob and the MIB cannot die, but neither will they hold power.  I get the feeling the MIB will be granted his wish, and he will be summoned home.  So too, Jacob.  Humanity has not achieved perfection, but the Island will be safe in Locke’s hands.

The final page will tell us all we need to know.  There are places in this world, and places inside each one of us, where we can find the enduring traces of our deepest humanity.  It is the unabashed assertion of human goodness in all of its cultural forms that provides the only possible basis for true freedom.  At the end of Episode 6.18 we will discover we are free, but more importantly, we will see in ourselves the deep roots of value, truth, respect, and collaborative enterprise that make us civilised, cultured human beings, magnificent in bearing.  And with the final word on the final page, we will no longer be LOST.

Related posts:

1. “Whatever Happened, Happened” Recap & Analysis by Chris Kirkman
2. SL-LOST Podcast – Ep 5.11 “Whatever Happened, Happened”
3. The Wounds That Heal Us – A Cultural Analysis of LOST 6.01/6.02

KATE, SAWYER, LOCKE, HURLEY, CHARLIE AND THE DHARMA INITIATIVE

FROM THE ABC HIT TV SERIES “LOST” REVEAL THEIR “LOST TRACKS”

ON SIX LOST EPS AVAILABLE EXCLUSIVELY ON iTUNES

The Final Season of “Lost” Premieres Tonight, February 2 on ABC

As pop culture phenomenon “Lost” begins its sixth and final season TONIGHT, FEBRUARY 2 (9:00-11:00 p.m., ET) on ABC, fans of the ABC television series will gain a unique glimpse into the minds of characters Kate, Sawyer, Locke, Hurley and Charlie, as well as the vibe of the Dharma Initiative, with the release of six EPs revealing classic songs important to each of them. Appropriately for characters stranded on a remote South Pacific island, these recordings are their “Lost tracks.”

Each seven-track digital download LOST EP–individually titled Kate, Sawyer, Locke, Hurley, Charlie and Dharma–will be issued by Universal Enterprises (UMe) exclusively via iTunes beginning today, Tuesday, February 2, to coincide with the season premiere episode of the popular, critically acclaimed and Peabody, Golden Globe and Emmy Award-winning series. The Lost EP’s can be previewed at The ABC Music Lounge on ABC.com.

“If you want to get inside the characters’ heads and find out what inspires and motivates them, then just push play,” said Executive Producer Edward Kitsis regarding the Lost Tracks EPs.

The artists heard on the LOST EPs range from classic rockers The Who, Rod Stewart, Traffic, Steppenwolf and The Kinks to new wavers Squeeze, The Specials and Elvis Costello; from country legends Patsy Cline and Hank Williams to R&B giants Marvin Gaye and Etta James. The selections, culled from the vast Universal Music Group archive, reach back to vintage gems from Muddy Waters and Chuck Berry, and ’70s tracks from Lynyrd Skynyrd and KISS, plus contributions from more contemporary artists such as Sonic Youth, The Roots and Eels.

Kate’s Tracks: LOST EP: A fugitive on the run, the strong-willed Kate Austen has a tumultuous past.
1. “Cherry Bomb” (The Runaways)
2. “Crazy” (Patsy Cline)
3. “Jack of All Parades” (Elvis Costello)
4. “(I Know) I’m Losing You” (Rod Stewart)
5. “Another Nail in My Heart” (Squeeze)
6. “Bad Medicine” (Bon Jovi)
7. “Somebody I Used to Know” (Elliot Smith)

Sawyer’s Tracks: LOST EP: Con man James “Sawyer” Ford at first was self-centered and disliked, but he becomes a trusted, courageous leader.
1. “Hair of the Dog” (Nazareth)
2. “Bad Moon Rising (Live)” (John Fogerty)
3. “You Got That Right” (Lynyrd Skynyrd)
4. “Farther Along” (Flying Burrito Brothers)
5. “Walk Away” (The James Gang)
6. “Strutter” (KISS)
7. “Love Ain’t for Keeping” (The Who)

Locke’s Tracks: LOST EP: A man of faith and a philosopher, John Locke believes in the mystical and spiritual to explain the world.
1. “Can I Get a Witness” (Marvin Gaye)
2. “Listen to Me” (Buddy Holly)
3. “Memphis, Tennessee” (Chuck Berry)
4. “Lost Highway” (Hank Williams)
5. “Mannish Boy” (Muddy Waters)
6. “I’d Rather Go Blind” (Etta James)
7. “I Put a Spell on You” (Nina Simone)

Hurley’s Tracks: LOST EP: Winning the lottery only brings loveable Hugo “Hurley” Reyes bad luck, including stays at psychiatric hospitals.
1. “The Seed (2.0)” (The Roots)
2. “C’mon and Love Me” (KISS)
3. “Jesus” (Velvet Underground)
4. “Call Me Names” (The Specials)
5. “Goodbye Girl” (Squeeze)
6. “Shangri-Las” (The Kinks)
7. “Fresh Feeling” (Eels)

Charlie’s Tracks: LOST EP: The most obvious character to have an EP, Charlie Pace is a rock musician who conquers his drug addiction while on the island.
1. “Gasoline Alley” (Rod Stewart)
2. “Less Than Zero” (Elvis Costello)
3. “I’m One” (The Who)
4. “Going Underground” (The Jam)
5. “Dirty Boots” (Sonic Youth)
6. “Lady Godiva’s Operation” (Velvet Underground)
7. “Empty Pages” (Traffic)

Dharma Tracks – LOST EP: The Dharma Initiative was created in 1970 by Gerald and Karen DeGroot and funded by reclusive Danish industrialist and munitions magnate Alvar Hanso. It was designed as a multi-purpose social science research facility where scientists and free-thinkers from around the globe could pursue research in meteorology, psychology, parapsychology, zoology, utopian social dynamics and electromagnetism.
1. “Dharma Lady” (Geronimo Jackson)
2. “Shambala” (Three Dog Night)
3. “Hot Burrito #2″ (Flying Burrito Brothers)
4. “The Acid Queen” (The Who)
5. “The Pusher” (Steppenwolf)
6. “Heaven Is in Your Mind” (Traffic)
7. “Bell Bottom Blues” (Derek & The Dominos)

ABC Music Lounge, which launched in May 2009 on ABC.com, provides users with an interactive online music experience that is uniquely ABC. Reflective of the network’s commitment to using digital platforms to deepen its relationship with viewers, the ABC Music Lounge showcases everything about the music and artists featured on ABC’s popular primetime schedule, offering a deep catalog of music-related content. The site features a streaming radio station programmed with over 12 hours of music featured on such ABC series as “Brothers & Sisters,” “Castle,” “Desperate Housewives,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Private Practice,” “Scrubs” and “Ugly Betty,” among others. Visitors to the site can get a glimpse of ABC’s music future as the radio station also showcases new music picked by series producers, music supervisors and others involved in the music selection process for shows that have previously seen tremendous success.

In addition to a streaming radio station, the ABC Music Lounge is home to music videos, exclusive performance footage, photos and behind-the-scenes interviews with artists, series producers and music supervisors on topics such as “why certain songs were chosen for specific scenes” and “how having their music featured within a show affected their careers.”

Related posts:

1. “LOST: What Will Happen Next?” Episode 2×01
2. “Whatever Happened, Happened” Recap & Analysis by Chris Kirkman
3. 5.01 “Because You Left” Recap By Gitsie Girl

[Via Watch with Kristin]

Related posts:

1. TV Guide Video Interview with Josh Holloway & Evangeline Lilly
2. Video Interview with Evangeline Lilly
3. Video Interview with Evangeline Lilly (Part 2)

[Via Watch with Kristin]

Related posts:

1. TV Guide Video Interview with Josh Holloway & Evangeline Lilly
2. VIDEO: Evangeline Lilly, Jorge Garcia & Josh Holloway Interview Each Other
3. Video: Evangeline Compares Working with Matthew & Josh

[Via TV Guide]

Related posts:

1. VIDEO: Evangeline Lilly, Jorge Garcia & Josh Holloway Interview Each Other
2. Evangeline Lilly And Josh Holloway COOL WATER Adverts
3. Video Interview with Evangeline Lilly (Part 2)

(Click to enlarge)

Related posts:

1. LOST Season 6 Cast Promotional Photos
2. New LOST Season 6 Promotional Photos: Sun
3. New LOST Season 6 Promotional Photos: Sayid

Created by Adam Beane:

I sculpted this as a promotional piece to showcase portrait sculpting at its most difficult- womens’ faces have subtler features then mens’ and subtle expressions are difficult to capture while still maintaining an unmistakable likeness.

Related posts:

1. New Photos of Evangeline Lilly in “Afterwards”
2. New Photos of Evangeline Lilly
3. Evangeline Lilly – ‘Afterwards’ Premiere Photos

Via Entertainment Earth:

If you’ve been searching for action figures from Lost, search no more. They’re right here! The twists, turns, and multiple threads that characterize the immensely popular Lost TV series give rise to distinctive and unforgettable characters that are ideal for the creation of unique, highly collectible figures like these 7-inch scale action figures from Bif Bang Pow! Incredibly authentic and lifelike, each spotlights a fan-favorite character from this exceptional ABC series and brings it to life on your own island or in your own living room. You’ll want to discover them all!

This set includes 2 individually packaged action figure 2-packs (subject to change).
1x Jack Shephard and Kate Austen
1x James “Sawyer” Ford and Juliet Burke

Featured in this amazing first set are ultra-realistic representations of Mathew Fox as Jack Shephard, Evangeline Lilly as Kate Austen, Josh Holloway in his role as Sawyer, and Elizabeth Mitchell in her portrayal of Juliet Burke.

Click here to pre-order this set.

Featured in this amazing 2-pack are ultra-realistic representations of Josh Holloway as James “Sawyer” Ford and Elizabeth Mitchell in her role as Juliet Burke, plus accessories.

Click here to pre-order this set.

Featured in this amazing 2-pack are ultra-realistic representations of Mathew Fox as Jack Shephard and Evangeline Lilly as Kate Austen.

Click here to pre-order this set.

Related posts:

1. Comic-Con: New Jack & Sawyer Action Figures
2. Season 5 – Sawyer & Juliet Photo
3. Matthew Fox’s RACER X Action Figure